


Blood Red Moon

by Fizwick



Category: The Walking Dead (Telltale Video Game)
Genre: Apocalypse, Dark, Death, Disability, Disabled Character, F/F, Physical Disability, Survival, Violence, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-03
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2020-01-01 09:33:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 43,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18333347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fizwick/pseuds/Fizwick
Summary: A story following the events of The Final Season of the walking dead. This is a darker take on the series that tries to capture the mood of season 2. A lot of work was put into this and I will try my best to stay faithful to the characters. Constructive criticism is welcome and encouraged as this is my first fanfic. I will not take offense. There may be formatting issues as it did not save formatting from Microsoft Word.If you are jonesing for more Walking Dead after playing The Final Season, this story is for you. Following the events of the final episode--see what happens as the group encounters the caravan and tries to figure out how to proceed with an unknown enemy. Will they overcome this obstacle or be destroyed by it? See Clementine survive as she deals with the trauma of her past.-Violet and Clementine have a relationship in this story-Louis had his tongue chopped out by Lilly-Tenn is Dead-Clementine chose to make AJ and herself "Hard"





	1. The Coming Darkness

In honor of Skybound and the Still. Not. Bitten. team, thank you for completing Clementines amazing journey.

 **Chapter 1**  
_I never thought I would make it to the other side. Every time I woke up in the morning there would just be one thing on my mind: Survival. To wake up at the dawn of a new day and not worry for once, was something foreign to me. Maybe that's a bit of a lie. There is always the sense of survival in the back of my mind, I don't think I could turn it off if I wanted too. Kenny taught me that. But without Lee, I wouldn't even be here._

Clementine looked up from the makeshift mattress, not the most comfortable thing in the world but it sure beats the front seat of a car. Dust flickered in the beams of light that crawled their way in from the outside. The light was warm on her skin but also blinding. The flickering of trees in the wind was the only relief to the intensity of the light. Her room sat quietly but the creaks of the school were noticeable in the distance, the cracking of wood and timber from a school that was somehow still standing. Clementine could hear Aasim working outside with Ruby but the sounds of them were almost inaudible here in her little paradise. _How could they be up so early? Normally I'm the first one._

Without thinking, her vision went instinctively to AJ's bed, a place he was clearly missing from. Suddenly a gnawing force was beginning inside her. *That* feeling in her gut. The same feeling she had to endure and suffer through so recently. She did not want to feel that way ever again, she would not let anyone take him, ever again. Clementines breathing starts to get more rapid as thoughts of AJ fill her mind.  
"What's wrong?" A small voice under Clementine squeaked out.  
Clementine looked down to see a rested Violet nestled in the blankets in front of her. The pale blonde of her hair flooding Clementines vision. The sweet smell of oak, filling her nose as she ran her hand through Violet's hair. Relief.  
"Aj must have gotten up already," Clem says like a cat to a mouse.  
"And?"  
"And, I'm just worried about him is all," Clementine says as she starts waking up.  
Violet adjusts around trying to get to the same height as Clementine but is failing spectacularly.  
"He is probably on patrol, you know that's his favorite thing to do," Violet says as she flicks Clementine's hand out of her hair annoyingly.  
"It's not like there is a lot to do around here Vi, you can only walk around this school so many times before the boredom sinks in," Clem says as she looks over the room and starts to get up.  
Violet puts her hand on Clementine's shoulder and pushes her down, getting up in her place.  
"You know he is _never_ bored when he is out on patrol, but it's fine, I'll go check on him for you," Vi says as she gives a little flick of her hand and a wink. Clementine smiles and closes her eyes as Vi gives her a kiss goodbye. Too sweet.  
Vi kicks clems stump-for-a-foot playfully. "Besides Clem, you still need to rest"  
"Ow, come on! It's still tender Vi." Clementine says smiling as Vi leaves her room.

Clementine trusted Vi more than anyone, second only to AJ. But even with Vi checking on AJ, her feelings would not go away. The feeling inside her was just getting more intense. It brought her back to the nights on the road, after leaving Richmond. No, it was even before that, A New Frontier. _When they kicked me out_. She could feel the anger still, deep inside her. She slammed the bed frame with her fist without thinking, the ting of pain brought clarity and calmed her down a little. The sour taste of AJ getting taken from her, no, of her letting him get taken from her. _Why did I let it happen? I trusted David and Ava, Lingard, all of them, how could they do that to me?_ A lesson. Even those closest to you can betray you. Clem looked down at the hand she had been running through violets hair and brought it up to her face and let the smell of oak fill her. Peace. If I could do it again, If it was possible to go back, could I have saved you then AJ? Would it have been justified? The silence of the room consumed her as she sat there for a moment composing her thoughts. Even after sending Vi there was no way she could wait, she needed to check on AJ _now_.  
Clementine pushed the covers off to the side and ran her hand down the side of the bed until the cool ting of steel slid against her hand. She grabbed it in a single smooth draw. A small pistol. She looked it over briefly and cocked it to make sure there was a bullet in the chamber. There was. She looked at the gun for longer than she intended to, almost entranced. Minnies gun. It had been a long time since she had used a pistol. In the past, while they were traveling Clem would teach AJ whenever she could-- as Lee did for her, but in combat? That fight with Minnie was the first time in almost a year that she had used a gun. It felt good.

Disgusted, and in a superfluid motion, she disassembled the top part of the gun and tossed it to the side.

The air was cool even with the sun high in the sky. The chirping of the birds hid the fact that just a few trees deep, walkers surrounded the school and could overtake them if their guard faltered even a moment. Clementine knew how easy it was for a community to fall. It had only been a few weeks but they had already made progress on cleaning up the burned down section of the school. Clem took it upon herself to set goals for the kids to work towards and rebuilding the burnt down section of the school was a good place to start. Keeping the kids working would push their minds off surviving for a bit. The hollow feeling in her stomach howled out as if in response to the thought. _Where is Aj?_

  
Clementine walked around to the front of the school, or more accurately limped with the help of her crutches. Vi and I had nicknamed them Cain and Abel and the thought made her smile. It was slow going but eventually Ruby came into view. "I was wondering when y'all would be getting up," Ruby said with a warm smile. Clem wanted to stay and chat but the gnawing feeling in her gut wouldn't allow it. "Have you seen AJ anywhere Ruby?" Clem said with false solace. Hearing her own voice raised her doubts and intensified what she was feeling. Every second apart from AJ made her feel like a fish out of water, gasping for breath.

  
Ruby puts her finger to her chin in thought "I thought he was with you?" Clementines stomach dropped, this is not what she wanted to hear. "Ah, I see, well if you see him, tell him to come to talk to me ok?"  
"Will do partner," Ruby said oblivious to the urgency of the situation. He's fine. He's fine.  
"I'm going to check on Louis, see if he has made any progress on the caravan," Clementine said turning away, she wanted to find AJ as fast as possible, but the thought she may be over-reacting was crossing her mind. _She was a little crazy after all._ Ruby gave a little wave as Clementine left, not too worried about what was going on.

  
It was not long before Clem bumped into Louis as he never strayed too far from the school, but recently he had been stepping up more. Just yesterday he managed to get us an entire deer, though I still don't quite know how he landed the shot. "Hey, Louis!" Clem yelled almost dropping one of her crutches. She stumbled a short distance but before she had even moved forward what seemed like an inch, Louis had rushed to her side. He gave clem the sign to hold it as he tried to prop her up. Clem blushed as she pushed him away, "I'm fine I got it, Louis, thanks though".  
Louis gave her the thumbs up as he punched her shoulder lightly with a grin.  
"You are the luckiest person I have ever seen Louis, I still don't know how you hit that deer," Clementine said thinking of when she first saw Louis shoot the bow. "I still can't believe it."  
Louis strutted around Clementine as he held his invisible bow to her head, "Well I am a ninja Clementine, maybe I have secret techniques even you don't know about." He said to the best of his ability but it came out as more of a garbled mess. It was hard hearing him like this with no tongue but Clementine could not hold back a chuckle as he circled around her. "You are quite the ninja," she said as she held out one of her crutches causing him to trip. "Woah Woah Woah" Louis exclaimed as he fought to regain his balance. Clem smiled but needed to get to the point, in her mind time was of the essence. "Look, Louis, I need to know if you have seen AJ recently?" Clementine said with haste. Louis pointed to the front gate with a worried look. "It's fine Louis, I have it handled, just keep watch on the south side ok? The wall is damaged over there I don't want any walkers getting in before Aasim can repair it." Clem said matter-of-factly. _One step closer._

  
It took a far shorter amount of time for Clem to reach the front gate than Louis, the thought of AJ gave speed to her walk. The dirt road was easy to navigate even with one leg, and she was getting better at walking with crutches. As she neared the gate she could see Willy keeping watch. "Hey, Willy!" Clem said waving as she neared, "Hey Clem!" Willy said glad to be doing anything but staring at trees in that very moment. Clementine waited by the ladder to the lookout while Willy slid down eagerly "I need a favor, Willy, go tell Aasim to keep watch and then come with me, I need some backup" Clem said motioning while her crutches were tucked under her shoulders. Willy looked somewhat shocked and pointed to himself, "Me?" he said with a perplexed gaze. Clem had a stern look to her face that only meant business, her mind was occupied with AJ, but she still needed to turn these kids into actual survivors. "It's been at least three days since you went out, you need practice," Clem said in a lecturing tone. Willy looked down shamefully, "You know I don't really like going out there Clem," He said as his voice crackled. "And I don't like walking on these crutches, but we gotta do what we gotta do," Clementine said patting Cain and Abel. Willy argued a bit but he understood Clem was trying to make them into better survivors and ended up running off to get Aasim to keep watch.

  
Clementine walked out the front gate, Willy would catch up with her, and she couldn't get too far ahead of him with these crutches. _Why would AJ leave without telling me?_ Clementine thought as she walked past zombified Abel. She looked over at it, it's decomposing corpse struggling to escape its bonds, but that would never happen. She checked the ropes herself. She picked up her right crutch, Abel, and paused a moment, she hated walkers more than anything in this world, they took everything from her, parents, Lee, every group she had ever been with. She was there the day her babysitter died, she watched as she turned into a monster and tried to gobble her up. Sitting for days in her treehouse as walkers desperately tried to eat her. Days of being scared and hungry. She shoved her crutch into its shoulder, **hard**. It moaned a horrifying moan as it snapped its teeth all around trying desperately to get to flesh, bone, anything it could devour. She pushed harder, the base of the crutch started to eat into the walkers decaying flesh. Thrashing around, It started to eat at her crutch, trying anything to escape and devour her. She hardly realized her face had turned into hunted resentful scorn, but the harder she pushed, the better it felt, she could feel herself starting to smile right as Willy came up behind her. "Ok ready. Whatcha doin?" He said startling her. Clem had been so distracted she did not even notice her surroundings. Shocked she pulled on her crutch which was now buried in the walker's shoulder. It ripped out with a violent spurt of walker blood. "Sorry Willy got a little distracted," Clem said brushing the moment off as if nothing had happened. Willy looked at the walker and made a disgusted face. He hated walkers but respected Clementine, and she looked like she hated it too so he spat on the walker "Don't fuck with us" he said in a childish tone laughing. Clem couldn't laugh right now if she wanted too.

  
Willy was no expert at killing walkers, something Clem wanted to change. She trained AJ since he was a child so she had some experience with training kids, and the best way to learn is through practice. She could kill two birds with one stone bringing him out here to help find AJ, not just that, whether she liked it or not she needed someone else with her due to her current predicament. Clem followed the dirt covered road, there was really only one place she could think of that AJ would want to go that was out the front gate, and she had told him to wait.

  
After traveling a long distance on the road they hit the spot Marlon had covered with chopped down trees. He did not want anyone getting to the school and so he had the kids block multiple roads into the school. Good for safety, not so good for a one-legged bandit. Willy had the knife Mitch had carved, it was a long wooden blade that had been stained red by blood. It almost looked too big for him, but Clem had become accustomed to it. "Stay on guard Willy," Clem said as she struggled to walk off the side of the blocked road. Willy stayed close behind her as they walked through the forest, sounds of walkers in the distance, but the others kept the area around the school relatively clear and safe. Traps lined the dense jungle areas and Clementine with Vi had turned the "safe zone" into a kind of kill on sight area for walkers. Getting to the main road was the hard part, they had done their best to cover the road in debris and cars in order to block people from finding the school but this also made it harder for them to exit out into the world.

  
Willy was having trouble navigating the forest due to his size and Clem due to her crutches, they were a pair of walking buffoons. Walking through the forest was hard but they only needed to bypass the road a little, until they could get back onto it. The path was difficult but known, the last few weeks they had been traveling it almost every day. They knew this area like the back of their hands. Clementine stopped suddenly and motioned silently for Willy to do the same. He did without saying a word. He knew when it was time to joke, and when your life was on the line. It was a single walker, a man in his 40s or maybe 30s, it was hard to tell as part of his face was hanging off. _A good time to practice._ Clem waved her hand directing Willy to go after the walker. Willy slowly snuck his way over to the bumbling walker. Clementine had taught all the Ericsson kids the basics of survival, the knee trick. Where to stab in the head for the best results. The way chopping weapons can get stuck. With a single walker, Willy had no trouble displaying any of those skills. His wooden knife had become an even darker shade of red when he returned to Clementine. "Easy," he said in an overconfident tone. Clementine looked over the knife and nodded. Clem thought back to the time she had been scouting with Luke, how overconfident she was, "Good job Willy but that was just one walker, too many and even the best of us can mess up" she said tapping her stump with a loose crutch. Clem saw the smile fade from his face as a hardened look took over. _Good_. Clem reached around to the back of her waist where she kept her knife, she ran her hand along the handle and felt the ridges of the fabric on the handle. Worn from time-honored use. Knowing it was there made her feel safe, in control.

  
A feeling that was dashed away without a second thought. The slimy hand came from unknown origin but grasped her shoulder hard enough to fling her to the ground. It stood over her like a nightmarish ghoul, rotting blood pussed out of it's gnawing mouth and down onto Clementine. So disgusting, but she had been through far worse. She scrambled back but finding her footing was difficult, she was still not used to her new disability. "Willy! Knife it!" She said, but looking over to the side she could see that was not going to happen. Two more walkers had suddenly surrounded them. _Where did all these walkers come from?_ Clem thought as she grasped for her knife that was in her fingertips only moments ago. _Where is it?_ It was missing. How could it be missing?! The walker like a moth to a flame lunged for her. Clem grabbed the walker by the throat as it fell, an insanely risky move but all she could think of at the moment. She used her other hand to constrain the movement of its arms but without both her legs getting any sort of leverage to get it off her was impossible. Willy was in no better position, Clem had taught the kids the basics, the tried and true method to kill a walker: Stab it in the head, but under all this stress Willy must have panicked. He had shoved his knife into the chest of a walker. It was stuck. Weaponless and now overrun by two walkers the situation was looking bad for Willy. It was even worse for Clementine. The walker had inhuman strength, it was swatting its hands all over the place thirsting for **her**. The walker's neck was one of the grossest, luckiest things she had ever put her hands on, bits of bone and muscle protruded all around it. The feeling was that of decaying flesh, rank and putrid. She gritted her teeth and tried to push the walker over to the side but without any leverage, and the walker fighting to bite anything it could, it took all her strength just to keep from getting bit _again_. The thought started to fill her mind, her hands started to shake. Something she had not felt since she was a child overwhelmed her: Panic.

  
Willy stood almost frozen at what was happening, too suddenly had they been over-run. This was definitely not normal. His hands started to cover his mouth as the two walkers descended upon him ready to devour him, and without a weapon, they would do just that. The walkers closed in, grabbing Willy by the arms as they pulled him closer. The delicious human flesh their only objective. Clem could only hear gurgling and gasping as she struggled for her life unable to loose the walker from on top of her. "Willy no!" Clem yelled, _How could this be it? We are going to die from a simple walk?_

  
The cold steel of Violet's cleaver slammed into the rotting flesh of the walker's skull with a loud thud. With her other hand, she grabbed Willy's knife from it's falling corpse as she kicked it away. In the next second the knife was hilt deep in the other walker's eye socket. Without a second thought, she drove her cleaver into the head of the walker on top of Clementine drenching her in walker blood. Violet was panting vigorously. Everything happened so fast but it felt like an eternity. The limp walker slouched lifelessly on top of Clementine and she struggled to flip it to the side. Violet reached down to help Clem up with the utmost urgency, "Are you all right Clem?" Violet said as she helped Clementine up. Willy was on the ground shook, his eyes fixated forward in a blank stare. The two walkers limp in front of him backs bent over backward in an almost ritual. "I've been way better, but no bites," She said as she looked at her shaking hands. This was new to her, and it scared her. She flung her hands downward in a swatting motion trying to shake out the shakes. "You don't look good Clem," Violet said as she tried to support Clem while reaching down to retrieve her crutches. "I was just attacked by a bunch of walkers Vi. Am I going to be sunshine and rainbows?" Clem said with a passive-aggressive tone. "That's not what I meant Clem," Violet said with a look of worry in her eyes, she knew what it was like to push people away, use that as a defense mechanism. What was Clem hiding from her? And why? Violet got Clem situated with her crutches, gave Clem back her knife, and went over to help Willy up. He reluctantly obliged and struggled to extract his knife from the walker's eye socket. Vi walked over and gave it a good yank and flung it over her shoulder to Willy who struggled to catch it. Vi looked over at Clem, something wasn't right. She had only been with Clem a short time but she felt incredibly close to her, she knew her body language better than her own, and Clem looked--scared. Vi shook her head, _Nah_. "I found Aj by the way," Vi said without missing a beat. Clem's eyes went from the ground to Vi faster than a car crash. "You found him? Then why isn't he with you?" Clem said confused with bristling eagerness to find him. Her insides felt like they were going to burst, but she tried to control the feeling, something she thought she was a master of. "You had the same Idea I had," Vi said as she directed Willy and Clem to follow her, "the only real place AJ would have gone would be to check on the caravan".  
"But I specifically told him to go with you Vi, why did he go off alone?" Clem said confused at what could have caused AJ to run off so fast.

  
"I'm not sure, when I found him he said it was an emergency and that I needed to find you ASAP," Vi said putting a hurried emphasis on each letter. "And good thing I rushed," she said with a smile, giving Clem a peck on the cheek. Willy rolled his eyes as they walked toward the clearing, they would be hitting the road again soon, but Vi was taking them further off track. The caravan had made camp directly on the road, something Clem had never seen before, in order to sneak up and observe them, they would need to take an elongated path around them so as to not be seen. The trek was hard for Clem, but not as hard as in the dense forest, the trees here were sparse and spread out. Good for her, but bad for sneaking, they would need to be careful. As they approached the caravan they got so low to the ground they were almost crawling. It made it really difficult for Clem but she had done this before and with a more tender leg. They had a designated spot to spy on the caravan with, it was far off the road in dense brush, but with a clear view of the full caravan.

  
It looked like Eight vehicles in total, they had formed them into an octagon in the center of a huge intersection. The vehicles consisted of what looked like four busses that composed the top, bottom, left, and right side of the octagon with smaller cars and vans comprising the other pieces in some sort of makeshift centrifugal wall. Most of the cars looked heavily modified but one of the busses, in particular, looked like something out of a cartoon, there were wires and steel tubes running all over the place with barrels randomly placed about. They had watched the group for almost two weeks and still had no idea what it was for. As they neared the designated spot Clementine's heart leaped out of her chest, it was AJ, and he was safe! _What a relief._ Finally, the horrible feeling inside her faded as she neared her world. Each step was a difficult process, even more so with these damnded crutches. But with each step, she got closer to AJ.

Alvin Jr. was looking through some binoculars that Aasim had gotten them, studying the caravan with intense focus and concentration. He was intensely aware of his surroundings, and as they approached he reached for his knife as he turned around. "Wow, that was fast!" He exclaimed as Vi, Clem, and Willy crept up to the spot. "You did say ASAP," Vi said with extra stress on each letter. Clem couldn't wait any longer, she reached out and grabbed AJ into her arms squeezing as hard as she could. She felt warm. Safe. The world vanished around her and all that was left was her and Aj, at this moment. She never wanted it to end. Aj pushed her away as he struggled to get free, "Clem we got serious business to take care of!" he said with the cutest face she had ever seen. It was hard for her to take him seriously right now but this was important so she tried to snap out of it. "Sure bud what we got?" Clementine said trying to get serious. Willy and Vi looked into the distance where the caravan was, but from here it was kind of hard to see without binoculars. "This morning I woke up and went on patrol, normal route like usual, I wanted to make sure there were no walkers by the broken wall." Aj said deadly serious, "that's when I heard a weird sound coming from above the forest. Almost like a whistle, but it was way above my head" He scratched his head in confusion "That's when I saw it, something in the air, some sort of disk."  
"A disk?" they all replied in unison. "A disk" he retorted. "It went right over the school!" he said throwing his hands up expressively, "It was drawing walkers right to us! I headed out right away and killed most of the walkers on my way here."  
"And the disk came from here?" Clem said pointing to the caravan. "I'm sure of it" AJ replied. _A disk? What's going on here? Did they attack us? Do they know we are watching them?_ Clementine thought as she surveyed the caravan. She grabbed at the binoculars without asking which AJ happily gave up to her. Looking through the binoculars it was hard to see much, they were all inside the octagon of vehicles and that blocked their view for the most part. Clem could make out a few people, probably on patrol or scouting. They had guns, full autos, at least two of them, and shotguns. They probably had pistols too. These guys were decked out. But what intrigued her more than the guns were their vehicles. How could they fuel all these motors? It was hard enough for me to fuel one car, let alone **eight**. Where were they getting their fuel? So many questions but no answers.

  
Clem and the others had been watching the caravan for over two weeks, they hoped they would move on quickly but as it stood, it looked like they weren't leaving anytime soon. Violet squeaked in next to Clementine, their shoulders bumping into one another. Vi grabbed the Binoculars out of Clem's hands without asking and looked through them intensely. "They have been hauling barrels from the train yard to their camp, at least one every other day." She said as she looked over the camp, "But this is the first time we have ever seen this disk thing, you sure it came from over here AJ?". Aj looked over at Vi and crossed his hands, "I know what I saw" he said scowling at her. Clem grabbed the binoculars from Vi, without asking, and took a final look over the camp. Nothing too interesting except the lack of walkers around their base of operations. Or so she thought. Around the back side of the camp on the opposite side of where they were positioned a herd of walkers was closing in on the caravan. Clem could make out different people directing the caravaners on what to do but one man stood out. A tall burly man with a trucker hat and a shotgun. He wore black gloves and a red bandana around his neck. He directed the people in the camp to defense positions but none of them were firing. They were about to be overrun by a herd yet no-one was firing. It was the strangest thing Clementine had ever seen, were these people accepting their impending death? The herd began to engulf the camp when out of nowhere a disk launched out of the center of the camp. The disk made an ear piercing howl as it flew over their heads towards Ericsons. The walkers seemed to be entranced by it and followed, right at Vi, Clementine, Willy, and Aj. "We need to decide what to do about these guys." Clementine said as she took one final look over the camp, "We can't wait any longer, they are attacking us now."

"I think we have bigger problems right now," Willy said as he pointed at the approaching herd and motioned for them to start moving. Clementine was the slowest of the group, but with the support of her friends getting back to the school was no problem. They managed to weed most of the walkers out of the herd by clever use of traps and singling walkers out. With Clem and Violet directing AJ and Willy, there were no issues in dwindling the herd to a manageable size before they returned. As they reached the gate Clem shouted to Aasim "Herd incoming! Be ready!". With Rosie and the other Ericsson kids, the remaining walkers barely made it to the gate.

"What was that about?" Aasim asked the scouting group as things died down. Clementine explained the situation to the other kids, about how they had been sending walkers their way, the disks, and how Violet had saved Willy and her. "We are going to hold a round table," Clementine said as the group gathered together.  
"Why do we need to hold a table up?" AJ asked Clem with an innocent inquisitive face. Clementine loved how uncorrupted AJ could seem at times. "No, AJ it's like a conference where knights hold serious discussions," Clem said pragmatically, this needed to be dealt with quickly, they had already taken too long. Aj looked up with a smile, "Oh I get it, so we are the knights!". Louis gave AJ finger guns confirming he had hit the nail on the head.

Aasim set up a makeshift "Round Table" that they could all sit around. While Ruby got them some candles to light the area. Clem had woken up very late and they had spent a large amount of time just getting to the caravan group, let alone all the work they did to try and thin the herd before it got back to the school. The evening was upon them. Louis set up some folding chairs that looked like they were about to turn into rust and Omar slid some Jerky he had made to each member of the round table. Aasim sat at the only thing that could be viewed as the head of the makeshift table. He sat with a large book open taking notes as they all talked. "So what is this all about?" Omar said as they all got situated around the table.

  
"Take a wild guess, Omar," Vi said sarcastically. Clem stood up, resting on her crutches which seemed to actually give her a little more hight than the others were used too, putting a hand out to silence Violet, she wore a very serious face that managed to calm down any chatter that was at the table, "Listen closely, we are being attacked by the caravan group. All those walkers we have been fighting the last week? It's no coincidence, it's absolutely the caravan. They have some sort of disk weapon they are firing toward Erickson. That loud whistling we have been hearing lately? It's coming from the disks." Aasim continued to write silently and Omar, Ruby, and the others all listened intently. Clem slammed her hand into the makeshift table with enough force she thought she might break the thing. "They almost got Willy and me killed in the forest!" Clem said venting her frustration to the group. Willy chimed in, "They had lots of weapons too.

  
"Shotguns and fully automatic weapons," AJ said trying to contribute to the conversation, he continued: "We won't be able to fight them head-on." Omar looked scared but held his own as he lifted his hand in protest, "Why do we even need to attack them at all? Maybe it was a mistake? We should just stay hidden, maybe they don't know we're here."  
"I'm with Omar," Ruby said in a monotone, "We should just try to stay hidden they will move on eventually."  
Violet looked annoyed, "Will they though?" she said without even looking at ruby, "They have been here over two weeks, and the more we check them out, the more entrenched they become. They don't look like they are leaving anytime soon, and now they are sending walkers our way."

  
"That's a fact!" Willy said stabbing his red wooden knife into the rotting table, fresh blood dripped from the edge.  
Ruby sighed and crossed her hands "So what? You want us to kill um' all?" She said directed at the group more than an individual person.  
Omar adjusted his seat, "If we attack them we are no better than Lilly, we should just go and talk to them."  
Clem thought back to the motor inn, the group of bandits that attacked them. She thought about Arvos group of Russians. Carver and his "family". A new frontier. Whenever she ran into a group with hardware like this, there was no talking to them. You did what they said, or you died. "We are not sending one of our own to their death in the off chance they are friendly. People don't patrol with those kinds of weapons when they just want to talk." Clementine said with a look of loathing.  
"What do you think Louis?" Violet said looking in his direction. Louis just shrugged and everyone watched in awkward silence as he wrote something down on a piece of paper. Violet picked it up and read it, "I think Clem is right, but I also think Omar and Ruby have a point." Violet crumpled up the piece of paper and tossed it behind her. "Lou, indecisive as always." Louis crossed his arms and frowned at Vi.

"Insurance" The singular word echoed from the head of the table. "We need in Insurance" Aasim chimed in with deep-thought behind his words. "We can't just walk in and talk to them, but I don't think we can just kill them all either, what we need is insurance that they won't harm us." Aasim flipped through his book until he came to a page that he poked with his pencil. AJ has reported that they frequently go to the trainyard to get barrels. We can use this against them. We can take a pair of them as--he choked as he adjusted his collar a bit--hostages."  
"Hostages?!" Ruby and Omar said in unison. Willy gasped as an uncomfortable look filled Louis' face.  
"There is nothing else I can think of," Aasim said as he ran through the pages of his book. "I think this is the safest way forward.  
"We would be no better than the Delta!" Ruby exclaimed.  
"We would be nothing like the Delta!" Clementine said with a flaming intensity that was magnified by the candles around her. "We won't hurt them, we will only use them as insurance as Aasim suggested. We find out what their plan is, why they are here, maybe get a better look at the inside of their camp, then we will return their people. No harm done."

  
Omar looked uncomfortable "Taking someone against their will is not right." he said looking down thinking back to how Lilly had stolen Aasim, Louis and himself. "How can you even suggest that Aasim?"  
"Like I said Omar, it's the only logical thing I can think up that puts us in the least amount of danger. We need some sort of leverage on them before we go talk to them or we are dead." Aasim said with little remorse. "I don't like it either"  
They continued to debate points back and forth but nothing really progressed past the initial point Aasim had made. They needed to make a choice. Would they fight? Or would they hide?  
It was getting late into the night and Violet was getting agitated by the lack of progress they were making "We put it to a vote like we always do" Violet said as she stomped off into the school. She returned with something in her hand and a bunch of pencils. It was Clem's hat.

  
"Write your vote down and toss it in the hat," Vi said as she held the hat out to be filled. Clementine was the first one done. She had already made her mind up. Aasim was next. Aj needed help with his, and Clementine obliged. Ruby put the pencil eraser to her mouth and sat in thought for a long while before casting her vote. Willy poked the side of his head with his knife as he filled out his piece of paper. Louis was second to last. Violet waited for everyone to finish before she plopped hers in. She shook the hat up and started pulling them out one by one.


	2. First Prophet: Chaos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clementine and friends find out the result of the vote and work to keep their home safe.

 The cool feeling of metal and power ran a chill down Clementine's arm and up through her neck. The weight of the gun gave truth to the feeling of control it granted. The trigger was heavy, there was little fear when Clem put force against it tempting a demon through the gate. _Of course, the trigger was heavy this gun was never used_ Clem thought as she failed to contain a smile. Clementine looked down at the body in front of her, it was Helen, the woman that was protecting AJ at McCarroll Ranch, and this was her gun. Everything felt so far away, but Clem was starting to understand. She turned the gun sideways to look down the slide, everything seemed foggy but one thing was clear: euphoria flooded through her head. _The gun was loaded_. _She was going to shoot me_. Clementine's grin widened ear to ear. "This bitch was going to shoot me!" Clementine said as she looked around the empty nursery looking for approval that wouldn't come. "You think you can just take him from me?" She said as she violently grabbed ahold of the dead woman's collar. The clarity was fading, all she could feel was guilt, fear, and anger. There was only one thing that felt good and that was the weight in her hand. The coolness of the grip against her palm. The kick as she pulled the unused trigger over and over, the bullets pouring into the poor woman's face. Blood had covered every inch of Clementine's face and her hands shook not from fear but excitement, adrenalin. Clementine couldn't see her own face but she could feel what was on it, not just the blood but the smile that crept from one ear to the other. The guilt was gone, everything felt so much better now. Everything was ok. I ended the threat, I got him back. _Him_? She looked up as a locker slowly opened in front of her. Blood had violated the inner area of the locker. It felt as if death itself emanated from within the locker. She wanted to run, somehow get away from it, but Clem had lost control of her body. She couldn't move, she couldn't look away. It was not AJ in the locker but her younger self. It was Clementine. A child wearing a white dress that was now stained a darker shade of a crimson. It was like she was seeing the world from the little girls perspective now. Tears flooded her eyes as she looked up, she expected to see her blood coated smile behind a gun but there was no trace of her left, all she saw was AJ looming over Lilly's dead body. "It felt good Clementine" AJ said as the body of Lilly slid down the floor and into the side the locker she was now in, the room shifting sideways. Clementine felt funny, that feeling of death permeated throughout her body, it was eating her up. Clem could see the bullet holes that lined Lilly's face as the blood drained into the locker drenching Clementines feet. So much blood. Then she saw a grim figure lurk out from behind Lilly yanking her hair back. Dark crimson flooded out of Lilly's neck as Clementines knife ran across it, the gaping slit almost able to match Clementines cheshire grin as she came out from behind Lilly. Clem leaned over the body hardly able to contain her shaking joy "It felt good" Clementine whispered into the childlike ear of her younger self.

Clementine awoke to a cold sweat. Her dirty bed sheets were drenched and she tore them off as fast as she could twisting around. Getting a handle on where she was, became difficult and she started to hyperventilate. She covered her face with her hands. Clementine could feel the sweat beading off her hair and onto the dry floorboards kicking up dust. "I didn't enjoy it," Clem said to herself trying to calm down. "I didn't enjoy it!"

Aj rubbed his eyes as he shifted to one side. "Having that nightmare again Clem?" AJ said half asleep from the other side of the room. It was still dark outside.  
Clementine looked up, she had forgotten where she was and hearing AJ all of a sudden was jarring. "Not quite the same one," Clem said half-heartedly, not even sure she was awake yet.

"I don't want to talk about it," Clem said as she felt around the bed for her crutches.

Frustration and anger guided her to them and she exited the room before the new feeling of claustrophobia overtook her. The sun had not even come up yet and she was wandering around the school, she had not felt like this in a long time - everything felt like it was starting to unravel. The cool feeling of winter ran over her skin as she walked down the humid corridors. It was the same feeling as when she had met the cabin group, broken people. The same feeling as when everything was falling apart back then. She took a deep breath and the cool air stung the back of her throat. Clem tried to focus on her crutches, not the dream she had just woken up from. She wanted to get away from it. Frostbitten air flooded over Clem's face as she opened the door to the courtyard. Her destination was unknown yet her path felt known. Tracing the path out in front of her kept her mind off the nightmare she had just witnessed, just felt. That's the part that scared her. How she felt in the dream was so real. Before she could try and brush the thought aside her destination did it for her. The school's bell tower. She eased her way inside which was a bit harder than she remembered. The interior was as bad as the exterior and the stairs were completely totaled. When she had come here with Vi earlier they climbed up together, but now she was alone and one leg down. All the stairs around the base level of the bell tower were rotted and destroyed, Clem had hoped she might find an easier way up than she remembered but it was apparent that was not possible.

Clementine looked up at the massive wall face in front of and above her. She let out a sigh of frustration. It looked insurmountable when just a few weeks earlier it was like child's play. Pain shot through Clem's leg as she grabbed her new stump out of frustration. Dust jetted off the wall as Clementine's fist slammed into it. A tear ran down her face before it was wiped away in anger. "I'm not fucking weak!" Clem said as she threw her crutches down onto the floor in a fit of rage. She hopped carefully to the wall she had scaled with Violet and reached for a hand-hold, and then another, and then another as she made her way up. The first three steps were easy. Everything after that was hard. Clem had never tried to climb a wall with one foot before and it was not easy. Each time she wanted to climb higher she would have to first make sure she had a firm grip with both hands before she could readjust her single footing. It was slow but not nearly as impossible as she had first thought and before she knew it she was at the top, more out of pure determination than her skill with three limbs. Walking out to building ledge was hard with no crutches but not impossible with the use of the building as support. Clem gasped as she exited the doorway, Violet was already here. Vi had fallen asleep in their spot. A smile ran across Clem's face. Without disturbing Violet, Clem laid carefully next to her. The feeling of warmth that came from her felt like safety and she tried to get closer. Being this close to her she could make out every detail on Violets face as the moonlight flooded over her. Violet adjusted around as if she could sense Clementine was there but failed to wake.

Clementine looked over Violet's face as she ran her fingers down her cheek. As if in response Violet lifted her head up exposing her neck. Clementine started to shake. _What was this? A sign?_ Clementine stared at Violet's ample neck for what seemed like days. Surely she would readjust? Yet she never moved. Clementine ran her hand further down Violet's cheek, past her chin, to her throat. Two fingers slid across Violet's neck. It was smooth -- real. Skin. _This is where I cut Lilly in the dream._ Clem ran her fingers back across Violet's neck, ran her thumb up to her chin. If she applied pressure right now she could be choking her. Her fingers twitched at the thought. Clementine stared at Violet as if in a trance, her body was moving on its own, satisfying its own curiosity. Her mind was foggy and dreamlike.

  
"What the fuck?" Violet said as she opened her eyes suddenly. Clem jerked back in initial shock. Violet had pulled out her cleaver, she always kept it on her and pressed it to Clem's neck. The knife was not cold, it was warm from being married to Violet's body. Clementine could feel the steel sliding against her skin, the small movements of Violet's hand intimately conveyed through the tip of the blade. Clementine blushed and pushed her neck forward without thinking, a small drop of blood started to form before Vi uncomfortably withdrew her Cleaver. "You are acting really strange Clem" Vi finally let out in a burst of frustration. Looking down, shame filled Clementine. There was a thick silence that marred the midnight air as Clementine mustered her thoughts together.

"Am I a monster?" Clementine said suddenly as if the thought might fly away. Tears started to fill Clem's eyes as she hung on Violets every movement waiting for her words. Vi looked over Clem and dropped the cleaver she was holding. It made a dull thud as it hit the outcrop of the bell tower. Violets hands were warm as they embraced the sides of Clementine's face. "If you are, then you are my monster," Vi said as she embraced Clementine. They kissed and Clem's mind finally went blank. It was four hours until they finally went back to sleep at the top of the bell tower.

Even with the sun high above them, the frosty air bit at Clementine's lips as they walked down the worn path to the train station.

  
"This is a bad idea," Aasim said looking over his shoulder to their rear as if to check if he was being followed. His bow was ready and at his side.

  
"Technically we're doing nothing fucking wrong," Violet said as she shrugged and walked at the head of the pack. Aj struggled to hold the bundle of rope that was tangled around him but did a reasonable job of keeping up with the group. Crutches bumped into random rocks as Clem kept pace in the middle of the group. When she had first started to walk on her crutches a simple bump like that would have shut her down completely but now she trudged through it no problem. A walker stumbled by Violet but she ignored it for the most part as they walked down the road. Drawing his bow back Aasim shot out an arrow hitting the walker square in the back of the head. He picked it up as they walked by its corpse. The thought of what they were getting ready to do occupied his head not the day to day survival that was currently a necessity.

"The vote was a draw," Aasim said, his voice was almost startling to himself because of its sternness.

  
"What's your fucking point?" An unviewable Violet spurted out.

  
"Look I'm the one that came up with the plan in the first place." Aasim said trying to break the tension "We can't just go against the group's wishes, that's like...a monarchy or something."

  
"I think you mean a dictatorship" Clementine said pointing up trying to manage a whisper, she wanted to stay out of the argument.

"What's a decore-ship? Is that like a pretty ship?" Aj said in a completely serious tone as they neared the train station.

Weighted down by a large toolbox, Aasim fought an internal struggle over which arm he wanted to sacrifice to get the toolbox he was carrying to where they were going. He looked over to AJ, "It's a place ruled by a person called a Dictator. They have absolute power and resort to force to get what they want." AJ looked at Clem and she looked at him, the thought of Abel flashed through his mind but he knew better than to bring that up to her. AJ looked down, "So Lilly?" 

  
"Yeah, for sure" Aasim replied with a nod, but followed up with the thought "If we just do whatever we want and go against the wishes of the group, how does that make us better than her?"  
Clementine stopped walking, her fist shaking in anger, "Look Aasim!" She said sticking her finger into his chest with enough force to almost topple him over "How is this anything LIKE what Lilly was doing?! She attacked us remember? Took our friends, our family. Tried to burn down our home. I've had enough groups taken from me, I won't let it happen again." Clementine brushed the dust off the front of herself and continued walking forward, "Honestly Aasim, I could give a shit about the vote" Clementine said with an unusual air of superiority and frustration, "I'll do whatever I have to do, to keep AJ and my friends safe."

They walked and there was a long silence before Clementine spoke up again "Look, we are not breaking the vote, but I'm not just going to let those guys keep sending walkers our way with no backup plan in place."

  
"Then why do I get the feeling this is going to go horribly wrong?" Aassim said.

 

As they approached the train yard the stacks of corpses started to come into view. As if the sight wasn't bad enough the smell permeated the air around them: putrid and rotting. The caravan group had come the day before so they were fairly sure they were safe. Even still, Clem had Violet keep watch while they tried to set up some traps. After the scout and kill, Clem shook the blood off her knife and scraped the bits of flesh against the wood of her crutches to clean it. A single warped tree sat in between a set of train cars, it was more black than wood and looked as if it had been struck by lightning and caught fire. The entire center of the trunk was blown open and as Clem neared Aasim the smell of burnt wood filled her nose.

Aasim and Willy were more knowledgeable about traps than anyone Clem had ever met. Kenny knew about knots and the basics of traps but he was not even close to these kids. It was as if they had been studying nothing but traps for years. Well, I guess there was not much else to do. Clementine bent down using her crutches as support, Aasim either didn't notice her or ignored her presence. Probably the latter.

  
"This seems kind of out of the way don't you think?" Clem said looking over Aasim as he worked.

  
"You are thinking of a primary set location, this is for long pig though," Aasim said with a chuckle.

  
"We don't want it to just randomly trigger, especially with the way the vote went, I'm going to put them out of the way on purpose."

  
"If they are out of the way, how will we get them to trigger the trap when we want it?" Clem said.

  
"Too much bait can be as bad as none at all, there are other lures that can be effective," Aasim said as he cut and sharpened a stick into a notch-hook.

  
"Like what?" Clementine said.

  
"The promise of something," Aasim said.

 

AJ loaded another brick from the collapsing train building into the cart. Alone each brick was heavy, but together they seemed almost impossible to move. Long had he been collecting bricks and each time AJ took a brick from the building he would think about how long building something like this would take. Every thought of it perplexed him, the sheer size of the train station, to the monstrosity of a train engine next to it. He remembered what Clem had told him about trains, but he could not picture something so big moving as fast as a car. Thoughts of the night he asked Clementine about the train ride to Savannah flooded over him. Ignoring them was no longer possible. Back when he asked her to tell him about it he thought there would be hesitation, a wall, but it was the opposite. She trusted AJ more than anyone. Clementine never talked to people about her past, and AJ only had bits and pieces of it at the time. There were things that burned into his head clear as the day, that he could remember, but other things were fuzzy and hard to recount like someone had reached into his head and scooped them out. The sudden openness from Clem was unexpected but welcome and AJ just let her talk. Her eyes told him she was talking more to herself than him.

Hours and hours she talked. She told AJ about how Lee lied to her about looking for her parents, about how Katjaa had killed herself, the stranger and her mistake. The mistake that took Lee's life. How she was mad at Lee and kept knowledge of the Stranger from him. How it cost her everything. "Lies are tools people use to get what they want, but they are a fickle thing," She said as she looked off into the night. She was faced away from him but he could tell she was crying. "I'd never lie to you," Aj said quietly in the silence. Clementine turned around and squeezed him as tight as she could. "And I'd never to you goofball," She said quietly into his ear as she wept into his shoulder.

These thoughts and memories would not leave his mind as he pulled the cart over to the side building.

Inside were what looked like train engines, two locomotives on either side of the large space. Mostly everything in here was old and rusting, the damp smell of mold dripped from the wood ceiling and filled his senses as he entered. Sunbeams blasted through broken and decayed chunks of the roof lighting up a small portion of the shadowy interior. Hard pieces of concrete jetted up out of the ground in random places. Dust and dirt littered the ground and tracks went from under the two locomotives to the outside area where Violet was keeping watch. Rails in this room did not fit flush to the floor and caused some difficulty for AJ. Old cartwheels coupled with the insane weight of the bricks made it impossible, if not humorous, for him to attempt crossing the tracks. But still, he tried.

He pulled and pulled for what seemed like forever but couldn't quite get it over the track. Out of frustration, he kicked the cartwheel, but it seemed to hurt his foot more than the cart itself. Aasim was sitting on a catwalk above the locomotives, he was hard to see in the dim light of the room but the rope dangling down from the catwalk did much to point him out. The sound of AJ's boot hitting the cart startled Aasim and caused him to bang his head on the catwalk railing. Taking ahold of the railing he propped himself up. It was not a long drop to the ground below, he slid under the railing and hopped down, the impact of the concrete on his feet radiated up his ankles. Without asking he grabbed the handle and easily pulled it over the track.

"Thanks," AJ said wiping the sweat from his brow.

  
"It's almost night, we've been here all day and we need to finish these traps before tomorrow. I don't want the caravan to notice them." Aasim said as he hauled the bricks to a metal barrel off to the side and started to fill it up. The metal barrel was rusted and old but had a solid bottom and places to tie a rope to. It was already half full and Aasim added bricks to finish filling it up. Sweat dripped off his head at a rate that almost alarmed him but he really needed to finish this quickly. Waving AJ over he gave him instructions on how he could assist and together the barrel was full in no time. Connected to the barrel, the rope swung high above the catwalk to a steel bar that traveled across the roof of the building. Wrapping the rope around his wrist he pulled with all his weight but the barrel did not even move, he pulled to the point his feet came off the ground and the barrel did not budge. He would need help.

Clementine walked up as if in response to his thought, Violet was beside her a dirty shovel over her shoulder.

  
"Good timing," Aasim said as he swung the rope over his shoulder and walked over to them slapping the dirt off his hands.  
Violet slammed the shovel into the ground and cemented it by kicking the shoulder of the blade. She left her foot there as a sign of authority, "I finished that fucking hole finally, dimensions you asked for - but I almost couldn't get out." She said with an ease to her speech. Clementine yawned as she ran her hand through AJ's hair messing with it in a tease.

"We are leaving soon right? I'm exhausted." She said as she adjusted her crutches. It was much more difficult to do even simple tasks with these crutches. In this state she even had to ask Violet for help with the hole, it was frustrating being weak and she just wanted to go back to the school and relax. It was unlike her. With the help of Violet, AJ, and Clem as weight, they managed to haul the barrel up to the roof. Even with rushing, it took them another two hours to finish all the traps and by the time they were done they were all drenched in sweat.

Darkness fell as evening overtook them. The number of walkers around the area had been very low. With the caravan coming here every other day the herd was weakened. After Violet's initial patrol she had a really hard time staying focused. Three hours in and it was almost impossible. She was restless and needed something to do. By the end of the day keeping watch was more of an afterthought. The focus was more on finishing the traps in time before the caravan had a chance to come back.

Aasim, Violet, AJ, and Clem had all gathered out by the tire swing, sitting in a semicircle. Lunch had been packed by Violet and she passed around some jerky and old protein bars they had found.

"Sorry for the lack of munchies," Violet said, "We don't have many perishables left." Clementine took a giant bite out of a strip of Jerky and leaned back, after working so hard taking a short break felt nice, the cool air flowing across her cheeks made the rest of the trainyard fade into the background as she closed her eyes and bit down on the big piece of meat in her mouth releasing a wave of ecstasy. Sounds of the trainyard faded as Clem sucked on the tough piece of meat, biting it every so often to coax the flavor out. This felt good.

  
A voice creaked out behind her as if in jest "The weak are meat - the strong do eat." followed with a low cackle and a shadow laced grin. Violet instinctively went for her gun, but it was gone. "Looking for this?" He said as he tossed the disassembled pistol onto the ground in front of them.

"I've had the gun for almost twenty minutes. And you never noticed." he said calmly "You must be the weak?"

  
The words hit surprisingly deep for their simplicity, Clementine had let her guard down. This is how it always happens. She felt sick, not because of the situation she was in, or fear, but because of her own stupidity. A stupid mistake. Clementine let out a giant audible sigh as she let the situation wash over her.

  
The man in shadows walked forward, or perhaps a boy? There was an air of maturity to him but he must have been very young and looked rather small in stature. He wore a colorful suit, or what was left of it, and a bunch of nic-nacks randomly spruced around like trophies. Of them she could spot: a small toy elephant hanging from his belt dyed red, a large die that replaced his bottom button, a bandana tied loosely to his cufflink, and a golden Koala pinned to his chest. There were others, but these seemed to stand out to her. In his right hand, he held a shining golden revolver. It looked like it was more show than function though, she had never seen anything like it.

  
"Cute toy" Clementine spat without thinking. She was in a daze at the moment, her surroundings had all but disappeared and the danger they were in was almost intangible to her.

  
"Toy?" The man replied as he looked at his gun in an act of confusion. He walked slowly over to the group as the light from the setting sun gave an ominous backdrop to his persona. "People like you who carry around no skill trash like that," he said gesturing over to the handgun on the ground, "and then act like you are something." he said as he reached into his pocket "Really piss me off." He slowly pulled out his closed hand, there were four tiny cartridges that she could see snuggled between his fingers and probably more in his closed fist. With a fluid motion that could only be done with a learned hand, he loaded the bullets into his road-show of a revolver and spun the chamber. It was shockingly quick as if to put credence to his own words.

With a look of superioridy, he leaned over Clementine. "You are pretty cocky for a cripple," the man said as he shoved the golden barrel into Clementine's forehead.

  
AJ looked like he was about to pounce on the man but violet had been holding his shoulder, she wanted him to wait. Aasim was trying not to shit himself.

  
"Well?" Clementine said, stone-faced and unwavering. "What are you waiting for? Pull the trigger"

  
The man looked at her with increasing curiosity. His hand started to shake, the cold revolver barrel pushing an uneasy indent into her temple. But Clementine could see his face, he was not scared, or angry, a giant smile had grown on his face as he struggled to confine it. The hammer on the revolver ebbed back to the look of shock on Clementine's face. The hammer slammed into the back of the bullet. And the next four of them. The shots rang out across the dead trainyard as a giant murder of crows flew above them startled by the sudden shock of noise. The man could only laugh, he could barely contain his excitement.

"You really are a tough cookie cripple," he said looking down at Clementine who was clutching her ears. She had fallen back due to the proximity to the shots and the man doubted the sound of his words were even making it to her, but little did he care at this moment. "God it's been so long since I've had this much fun, it's so annoying when they just start crying right away. So weak and feeble, not worthy. But you guys...I can tell from this short encounter that I've finally hit the jackpot. The boss might actually be happy for once. I guess we can do the test."

Violet had rushed over to Clementine and she seemed to be regaining her hearing "Are you fucking stupid? You must have drawn every walker in a fifty-mile radius" she said in fury as she tried to help dust Clem off. The man's smile vanished as he reached out in an explosive lunge and grabbed her by the neck. He was insanely strong, it was hard to tell with the baggy torn suit he was wearing but this guy was ripped. As Violet struggled against the man she could feel his muscles under his clothes. This guy was no joke, he may look scrawny on the outside but it was like everything about him was contradictory. He raised her into the air as she struggled to breathe "Do I look stupid to you woman?" he said as he tossed her to the ground. Violet couldn't talk but she gave him the most disgusted look she could muster.

Clementine had started to get up to defend Violet but had forgotten about her own leg and stumbled.

  
"We are going to play a game," he said as he fiddled with his revolver "And one of you might actually be worthy. Maybe it will be the boy?" he said chuckling to himself in unbelief.

"Worthy of what?" Aasim said suddenly to the man, he was trying to get information from the man and he thought this might be a good time to chime in. "If you make it that far, you won't care anymore," he said cryptically.

"What kind of test?" Aasim said as if every moment he wasted was their last. "The kind of test where people die," The man said with a grin. "We will do it right here," he said pointing his gun to the spot at their feet. The man kicked a flat piece of wood that was nearby to the spot he had indicated. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a prescription bottle and tossed it to AJ. He caught it without issue. This may have looked like a simple action to the group but the test had already started. There was no delay when the man tossed the pills to the boy, he wanted to test his reaction time. Every movement, every action was being watched. The man had changed. Gone was his smile and carefree attitude. It was as if a switch had been flipped and now it was down to business. The golden revolver hovered in the air as the man decided on the next step he should take.

Abyss was all Violet saw down the barrel of the revolver. "How many shots do I have left?" The man asked Violet as he pointed his gun at her. "Excuse me?" Violet responded "How the fuck would I know?" the man fought a grin "Who's stupid now?"

"One. One bullet is left" Clementine chimed in, her hearing obviously restored. The man glared over to her in anger but let it go. "Correct." He said as he spun the chamber. "At least one of you might make it out of this, but I doubt it," he said as he looked at Clementine's leg.

"Open the bottle boy," he said motioning with his gun. AJ did as he was told and dumped the contents over the piece of wood in front of them. Pills, all different types spread out over the flat surface, little square pink ones, blue ovals, white tablets, pills of all colors and sizes.

"What are these?" AJ said in confusion as he picked up one of the pills and looked over it.

The man gave AJ an understanding look "The cure: to pain, loneliness...sanity. A relic of the old age. Weakness." Walking behind them he jabbed the gun into the back of Aasims head.

"Woh what are you doing!?" Aasim said shooting his hands up into the air in a sign of surrender. "We are starting. Weakness or Chance? He asked and waited. It was almost as if he had turned into a statue perfectly still as he waited on Aasims response. Clementine looked at his hands, they were steady, he had done this before, but how many times?

"What do you mean?" Aasim said in confusion "WEAKNESS OR CHANCE!?" the man said again. Resolute. Aasim started shaking not knowing what to do "I don't know!? Uh, 'chance' I guess."  
The man without delay pulled the trigger on his gun, the click of the hammer booming in the silence around them. Aasim's head recoiled in reaction to the kinetic energy conveyed through the barrel.

  
The man moved to the next person who happened to be AJ. The barrel of the gun found its new home at the back of his head. Clementine tensed up, she was putting together the game as they played it. Weakness and chance, the pills and the gun. She understood it but how could you even win a game like this? What was this even testing? Her mind was racing but she had to save AJ. Who knew what those pills were but it had to be better than a bullet to the brain

"Weakness, choose weakness AJ," she said before the man had a chance to ask his question. The side of his pistol against her face was the next thing she felt. "It's not your turn yet," he said as he put the barrel back to AJ's head. "Weakness or chance?" he asked AJ.

"Weakness" AJ said like it was poison. "Take a pill," The man said as he hovered menacingly over AJ.

"Which one?" AJ said as he looked over the colorful display of pills, almost candy-like in appearance. "Take a pill," he said as he pushed the revolver barrel into AJs cheek. AJ grabbed a white pill at random and popped it into his mouth and started to chew. He had never taken a pill before and the bitterness overtook him as he started to spit it out. "Swallow it all," the man said stopping AJ from spitting.

The man moved on to Violet. The question was asked and Violet took a few moments to make up her mind before crossing her arms and answering "Chance you piece of shit" The man smiled and pulled the trigger. The bang of the hammer slamming against the steel gun shocked her, but her continued consciousness was even more of a shock.

"Wow we got some lucky kids today," the man said as he walked over to Clementine, he had taken a liking to this girl. Too bad she was damaged goods, sadly she would never be worthy...yet she intrigued him. It was so rare to find this type. Though as the apocalypse went on it seemed more and more common. The man put the gun to his temple, the shock on the faces of the kids gave him pleasure. He smiled "Chance" his finger slowly pulled the trigger as he licked his lips. The click was dull and he stood unrelenting.

Clementine saw the man walking over to her, she reached out and grabbed a pill at random. There was no delay swallowing it. The man spun the revolver around his finger in a flourish. "You figured it out didn't you?" The man said walking over to Clem pushing his gun into her body in uncontrollable lustfulness. He ran the gun up the side of her body, her look of disgust only seemed to fuel him though. "One round and I bet you already have it figured out, normally it takes two or three people dying before they realize."

  
Violet had taken advantage of the moment, she gestured to AJ and pulled out her hidden cleaver. While he was distracted with Clementine, the disgusting invasive thought eating at her, she would attack. The cleaver felt so perfect in her hand and even better as she swung it down into this piece of shits head. The joy as she swung it down into his head was ecstasy. An ecstasy that was taken from her, the sound of metal on metal rang across the courtyard as a shower of sparks rained over Clem and the man.

He had raised his revolver behind his head, he was not even looking at her: he was looking at Clementine. Violet couldn't see it, but Clementine could. The look on his face when he blocked her attack. The feeling of unmatched superiority that washed over him in this one flourish. He had not only anticipated the attack from behind - he blocked it without even looking. Drool left his mouth without his notice, pride in his own ability overtook him. Violets cleaver had landed between the grip and the trigger guard.

The man turned around and used it as leverage to knock her off guard, he twisted his revolver around and grabbed her wrist with his other hand, he disarmed her in one swift motion. Violet grabbed her wrist as she fell to the ground. She had expected AJ to help her, but he was nowhere to be seen, she looked back to check on him. AJ was there but he was bent over puking out what little lunch they had consumed. Swinging his gun around the man pointed his revolver at Violet "Interfere again and I'll shoot you" he said calmly, Violet scoffed and looked to the side "With what? A fifty-fifty chance of killing me? Good luck."

The man brought his attention back to Clementine. The moans of walkers could be heard around them, the gunshots had finally drawn some walkers to the area. "Explain it to her Clementine," He said as he brought his gun up her mid-drift and poked it into her chest teasingly.

  
"His gun has six chambers, Violet, he has already fired the gun four times, I can assume he knows the location of the bullet, through either sight or sound of the chamber spinning, maybe his familiarity with his gun, regardless, he knows where the bullet is. This game is a farce. She picked a pill off the board and looked at it inquiringly, eventually, we would all have to take a pill or a bullet"

  
The man looked over her and licked his lips "Everyone has weakness in them, the test is if you can overcome it."

  
Brandishing his gun at Violet he motioned for her to take a pill. Aasim and Violet both reluctantly reached for their respective pill.

  
Clementine felt strange, her eyes were becoming droopy, and keeping focus on the area around them became increasingly hard. After everyone had taken a pill the man reached into the assortment of pills digging around for a specific one. He dug out a bright blue pill, it was round with the word SKY printed on it, the way he took it showed this was not his first rodeo.

  
"So is this stupid fucking test, or game or whatever over yet?" Violet blurted out, the anxiety of the current situation overwhelming her.

  
The man laughed as he flourished his pistol in a sort of victory stance.

  
"This was just preparation for the true test. You must accept weakness into your body and overcome it. Pick those pills up and put them back in the bottle cripple" he said pointing at the pills with his gun.  
Clementine felt woozy, it was hard for her to stay focused on the bottle. "My name is Clementine, thank you very mooch" she said, the slurred word making her giggle to herself slightly. AJ was having trouble staying standing and looked like he was trying to fight invisible walkers. Violet and Aasim looked normal.

  
"Clementine, that's a bright name." The man said looking down on her face that had become that of a sloth. Her eyes were almost completely closed and she started to lay down on the ground. The man was now stooping over her limp body. He gave up fighting his grin. "My name is Fickle Mick" were the last words Clementine heard before she lost consciousness.

 

 

When Clementine woke up it took her a while to get her bearings. Violet, AJ, and Aasim were gone, so was that man... _What the fuck?_ Clementine looked around, she was deep in the forest. It was hard to concentrate, whatever she had taken was still in her system. She felt tired and confused. _What did I take?_ She guessed some sort of sedative. There was no way for her to stand up, her crutches were gone. Then she saw it, right next to her - how could she have missed it? A walker! It was crawling towards her, reaching out with everything it had trying to tear flesh from bone. Its teeth chattered as it tried to bite her. Clementine tried to crawl backward away from the walker but she couldn't. Something was stopping her. Attached to her only remaining leg was a large metal chain. It had been wrapped once loosely in kind of an overhand knot around a tree far in front of her. The other end looked like it was attached to the walker right in front of her. The only thing keeping the walker from getting to her was the thing keeping her from safety.

Clementine struggled with the metal brace wrapped around her ankle but it was too tight and it hurt when she messed with it. She looked around for anything she could use to try and escape, maybe pry the brace from her leg? Behind her, there was a small box. It looked like it had been placed there intentionally. Crawling with everything she had she tried to reach the box but it was just out of reach. _That fucker_. _He is toying with me_. "What a fucking joke," she said out loud to herself as she took off her jacket and used it as a hook to drag the box closer to her. She opened it and inside there was a note, she pulled it out of the box and read it:

  
**You better be quick if you want to find your friends, but you might not have any feet left to stand on. Use your head and you might be able to find them.**  
**-Fickle Mick :)**

Below the note was a handsaw. It was flimsy and Clem knew it would be too fragile for the metal chain. No, she knew exactly why he gave her this. She looked over to her leg and threw the box to the side in anger. Clementine sat and cried as she thought about her friends.

 


	3. Second Prophet: Tartarus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First I want to say, sorry this took so long. As I was writing this chapter, when I was about eight pages in my power went out, because of the way my writing program auto-saves (in case of a crash) when it crashed it actually corrupted the file and made it into jibberish. I know there are people that have lost entire books but this was a real setback and shock for me. At least now I have some idea of how that feels. Nevertheless, I took it as a sign from God to do my original idea for the chapter. I don't know if people will like this chapter, it gets dark in some places, but it is what I originally wanted to do and I feel like it stays true to what actions the characters would take. The next chapter will most likely be the final chapter. The endnotes contain minor spoilers so be careful.  
> Enjoy.

       

           Aasim ran, ran as fast as he could from the lumbering monstrosity that was following him. A sharp sting of pain radiated up his leg as the metal shackle bit into his ankle yanking his leg out from under him. Warm blood streamed from his forehead as it slammed into an exposed rock on the ground. Spinning, he looked around trying to get his barrings. It was hopeless. Trees and bushes wobbled back and forth as the contents of his stomach fought their way out, finally victorious. It was hard to think, and that was his strong suit. Aasim ran his hands over his face trying to get the blood out of his eyes. Euphoria ran over him, but so too did nausea and dizziness. The pill, whatever it was, continued to break apart his mind. Behind him, the low guttural growl of the walker hunting him vibrated through his body. Struggling to get up, he summoned all the strength he could muster and continued forward. He could feel his fluttering heartbeat as he hobbled away.  _If I could just rest for a second, maybe I could come up with something, anything._  It was hard to think. A rock hit his foot and he stumbled again, tumbling to the side, but he was able to regain his balance in time, he looked up and saw it. The disfigured entity floated just in front of him, it's twisted face hidden and distorted by shadow, its eyes clearly visible. Haunting eyes that went through him, he could feel his body shaking, a cool sweat lined his arms and legs as he stood, trapped in a waking hell. _Clink, clank, clink, clank,_  the sounds of the chain as the walker trudged toward him. He was finished, trapped in a pincer formation.  _What a shitty way to go_ , He thought, but the thought stuck in his head and twisted. He was tired of running, tired of fighting all the time. He felt good right now. It would be fine to give up here. Finally have peace. Finally not have to fight anymore. Aasim looked forward at the horrific display of twisting appendages in front of him. Grotesque and lumbering it stood. Blood red eyes peered out at him. Fear had left him and only euphoria remained. He reached out and embraced death.

Without delay, his hands found their way to the slimy backside of the walker. Rotting flesh felt oddly cool in the palm of his hands. Delight and exhilaration flooded over him, he had never felt like this. He dug his fingers into it and squeezed, waiting for his own demise. But it did not come.  _Clink, clack, clink, clack_. Cold breath lined the beams of moonlight as his eyes slowly opened.  _Why wasn't it over yet?_  Slimy flesh gave way as he dug his fingernails into the back of the walker. Loud cracking rang out as he pushed them into the firm slimy backside of the walker. Aasim pulled the walker as close as he could, his nails ripping away at what was left of the rotting skin. Pain pulsed through his fingernails as the flesh ripped away. Aasim lost his footing to the slick roots beneath him and tumbled still clutching his fists tight. A giant  _thud_  echoed in his own head as he slammed backwards onto the ground, or rather into it. There were a few inches of firm black mud that he had fallen into, the unnatural substance seemed to pull on him as he tried to get up. He started to panic as he struggled to get to his feet but ultimately failed. Bugs had started to crawl out of the mud and onto his body, thousands and thousands of bugs. He screamed as they engulfed his body, he struggled to swat them away but it was impossible. Lumbering above him the walker had finally reached its meal. If only a walker could lick its lips. Aasim could just make out it's deformed face before it lunged at his flailing body. The world went black.

Luminous and towering the moon lurked above. It was the first thing Aasim saw as he opened his eyes.  _A waxing gibbous moon_ , he thought as he lay there smiling in the moonlight. Thinking about the moon jumped started his brain. Suction from the mud around him was strong but with a little force he sat up just fine. With his right hand, he waxed his head as if he was trying to get the cobwebs out. Everything was starting to spin again but he needed to concentrate and figure out where he was, what was going on.  _Wait a second_ , he thought as he looked around himself. As if answering his own question the rotting skull of a walker sat looking up at him, a giant piece of sharp wood jetting out of its right eye and half of its temple. He jumped back in shock. Aasim looked over its body, it's feet were stuck in the mud. It must have tripped and fallen onto the piece of wood, he thought as he sat there oblivious to the mud he was sitting in,  _But what about the other walker?_  Aasim looked up from his legs to where the other walker had been. Perhaps because the moon took pity, it chose to elucidate his query. The walker had been so real before, but now he clearly saw it, the monstrosity he had seen before, but it was no walker, it was a deformed oak tree. Looking down Aasim pulled his left hand out of the mud and finally released his grip on what he had been holding. Moss, wood, blood. One of his fingernails had come off and he had not even noticed. He let it fall into the mud as he struggled to stand. Everything was still spinning. Trudging through the mud to the oak tree he ran his hand along the malformed trunk. Thoughts of his attempted suicide filled his mind as his stomach unloaded. Confusion and dizziness still filled him because of the pill, but at least he could think again. _I need to find my friends before it's too late_ , he thought as his hand ran across the tree,  _my family_. Fickle Mick had seemed like a force of randomness but Aasim got the feeling there was more to it than that. It seemed there was a deeper meaning to it all. Testing them, but why? For what purpose? A sharp pain radiated through his hand as a splinter dug its way into the side of his finger. Blood trickled out as he sat there thinking about their encounter. Aasim had never seen someone like Mick before, someone who looked like such a joke, yet so skilled. Skill like that, he had never seen it before - well, maybe he had seen it once: Clementine. Looking around gave no clues as to his location. It was night and he was in the middle of a forest, finding his way back to the school would be near impossible like this. He punched the side of the tree lightly more out of frustration than to do any actual damage to the tree. Moss cushioned the punch slightly as bits of the mucky plant matter fell to the ground. Bits of moss.  _Moss_ , He thought as he stood staring at the side of the tree. He ripped out a giant chunk of moss laughing. Drug enhanced euphoria and pride flooded his mind.  _North_. He knew which way north was now. He could find his way home.

Clementine slammed the rock into the helpless walkers head over and over. She was tired and her head was heavy because of the pill - but rage easily pulled her through. Over and over she slammed the rock into its lifeless head until she suddenly switched focus to its kneecap. Once she could see the exposed bone she tossed the rock aside and dug her hands into its rotting flesh, ripping sinew and muscle apart. Rotting bone and mucus flooded out of the open wound as she ripped the monsters knee joint apart almost screaming in anger. The shackle easily came off the walker's leg but her ankle was still attached so she wrapped the chain around her torso and shoulders, the added weight was not pleasant. "Mother...fucking...Mick..." she grumbled as she crawled her way over to a fallen tree, it was dark but luckily she had moonlight to assist her. Her crutches had been taken so she would just have to figure it out herself. A tree branch had broken off but it had been partly hollow and malformed, she grabbed it and held it against her amputated leg, it fit snugly against the base of her stump without jetting into it,  _it would have to do_. She took a rock and broke off the slim end to try and get it to the same length as her other leg. She had seen things like this in cartoons and movies before the world had gone to shit, pirates had them, peg legs. Would it actually work though? She would have to  _make_  it work. She grabbed some long plants around her to use as cordage and affixed the "peg leg" as tight as she could withstand. It seemed sturdy - she could not delay, she needed to find AJ, Violet, Aasim. Using the tree as a prop she tried to stand up. The taste of dirt filled her mouth as she slammed into the ground.  But she would not stop, could not stop. Using everything she had, she tried to stand again but the pain was too great and she tumbled again. Not only was it hard to balance, but her leg was also not fully healed yet. Every step she took with it was a living hell, the pain radiated to her back and up the bottom her spine to her very core. Looking around she could see a long stick, she picked it up and used it as a makeshift cane. Each step was hell on earth, but she would walk through hell a thousand times for AJ.  

Blood shot out the back of the walkers head as the makeshift blade found a home in the recesses of its eye socket. Sadly its home was dashed away in a swift motion as it dug into a second walker. AJ smashed his blade into the twisting monster without hesitation, a second stab to its forehead just to be sure. Swinging around he was surrounded, multiple walkers, he tried to count them but couldn't. Slowly, roughly, they approached him. His back was to a cliff, he could not see the bottom in this light. Running away would be impossible.  _As if he would run_. Clinching his makeshift knife with everything he had, blood dripped from the handle. Knee cap, temple. Scarlet colored the air as the small blade exited the walkers head and found its way into a second. AJ scrambled past the two dead walkers to try and get better positioning but slipped on the slick wet ground. Sliding, AJ kicked the ground and used his momentum to get back to his feet. Colors assaulted him as he looked over the remaining walkers. Sweat flew as he ran at the walker and leaped, jamming his knife into its rotting head. It fell to the ground, AJ on top, with a thud. Panting AJ tried to catch his breath but it was not possible, more walkers were headed to him. AJ had been fighting walkers for hours. Without break. He was exhausted from the neverending fighting but he would not relent. There was a single walker left, it lumbered toward him slowly, meticulously. AJ could sware its eyes were glowing red, a violent red he had never seen before. Fear filled him as he stared at the walker. _Why am I scared?_  He thought as the beast approached him. Why was it moving so slow? AJ's hands started to shake, he could feel the aura around this walker, he was going to die. Slipping because of his sweat, AJ almost lost grip on his knife as his back crashed into a tree. He had not even realized he was backing up. The walker mumbled as it approached him, seeking living flesh. AJ slammed his blade forward with everything he had aiming for the walker in front of him. The walker grabbed his arm as it pushed him to the ground. AJ could hear the clattering of teeth as walker saliva dripped onto his face, the monstrosity vying for a piece of him. AJ struggled as best he could but after hours of fighting, he was already exhausted. Both his arms were pinned to the ground by the walker and he couldn't move. Tears filled his eyes as he faced his inevitable doom. "I'm sorry Clem, I tried, I'm so sorry, I just wasn't good enough." He said panting due to exhaustion. His tank was empty, he was past his limit thirty minutes ago. He cried as darkness and the walker took him.

It was dark, even the moonlight had gone into hiding. The air was damp and sticky, but cool. It gave Clementine a chill down her spine as she looked down at AJ's unconscious body. Looking around the area it was easy to see what had happened, everything was destroyed, bushes, trees, walkers. The ground was worn where AJ had been fighting. Even in the dark Clementine could make out the blood that littered the ground and trees. Carefully Clementine looked at AJ's hands: they were wrecked. AJ had been holding that knife so hard and using it so much, that it had dug into his flesh and ripped his hands apart. What AJ had said just before he passed out had echoed to her soul, she was proud of him, but also  _sad, guilty_. Tears fell as she embraced him. 

She was lucky to have found him, and she realized now why she could. Mick had kept them close together. She knew why she felt it as soon as she read the note in the box. The feeling that she was being watched. All of them must have been under surveillance since this started. This was just her intuition but she wanted proof, something more concrete. Nothing he was doing made any sense to her, what was his goal? Laying AJ against a tree nearby, She hobbled around the area briefly looking for clues. With each step, intense pain shot up her leg but it had become just another part of her, something that had to be endured. Blood and guts along with mangled trees lined the path and it was easy to follow it back to its starting point. Dead bodies lined the area and a chain was laying by the dead walker it was connected to. AJ's leg had probably been too small for the shackle to have been fastened securely. Outside the perimeter of the area, there was a small clearing in the brush, it was hard to see but the outline of a shoeprint was clearly visible to Clementine. Painfully she bent down and examined the area around the trail. Nothing. Searching for a few minutes produced the same result but she was able to follow the footprints around the site and work out a probable path he may have taken. It was winding and she was getting farther away from AJ, it made her uncomfortable. Then it came, she crouched down to the most recent print. Every print up to this point had produced frost in the recesses of its track, it was turning into a particularly chilly night. This track, however, had no frost, it was recent. Her head shot up and she looked around the area, her ears hyper-focused on every sound but it was impossible in this noisy forest. Chills ran down Clementine's spine as the thought of that creep watching them filled her mind. 

Clementine slapped AJ as she tried to shake him awake. It did nothing. "AJ wake up!" she yelled as loud as she dared. His face remained motionless, he had passed out due to exhaustion. Time was ticking and they needed to get back to the school, warn the others, and try to find Violet and Aasim. Quickly she looked around and formulated a plan, she needed a way to carry AJ back to the school. The chain around her torso clanked and fell as if to tease its additional weight. Clementine just dug her makeshift peg leg into the ground and accepted the pain in defiance. Looking over the area there was one thing she had an abundance of. Dead walkers. Carefully she stripped the clothes off the walkers nearest to them. Blood soaked and stained them. It was not hard to make a makeshift sling but it did take her some time. Moving around was hard and the only tool she had to work with was AJ's small knife. After it was complete she lifted AJ into the sling and secured him to her back. The weight of AJ and the chain was too much. Pain shot up her leg and she fell to her knee, the soft ground cushioning the impact slightly. Even with the makeshift cane, she was unable to support all the weight. Falling to her side she lie there thinking of Mick.  _Cripple_. It rang through her mind, stinging, overwhelming. Her fist slammed into the ground as she pulled the sling off her shoulder. "I'll show you a fucking cripple you piece of shit," Clementine said taking hold of a long branch and attaching it to the sling. It would need to be reinforced so she wrapped it as best she could in denim. Hopefully, it would hold until they reached the school. She had made the sling into a makeshift sled, the denim acting as a way for it to slide against the ground, she held the piece of wood under her arm. A t-section had been tied at the end to give her more leverage but the wood dug into her soft flesh all the same. Each step was hell on earth.

Thought had left Clementine's mind, the only thing left was pain. Even the sight of the school was pushed to the side. If she thought of anything else but pushing forward she would collapse on the spot. She had to push forward. Push, forward. Her head slammed into the front gate as she fell to the ground. No one was on watch. Clementine struggled to take another step forward as her consciousness faded, the pill finally taking hold. Clementine carefully pulled AJ in front of the gate before collapsing. Finally, rest.

"Clementine! Clementine!" Violet screamed as she shook her one true love. Blood covered Violet's body and face, the chime of steel hitting stone rang out as she dropped her bloody cleaver to the ground embracing Clementine. Violets breathing was strangely heavy, and she was covered in sweat. She ran her fingers through Clementine's hair brushing it to the side. Her thumb traced across her cheek. Violets breathing intensified and she could now see her breath in the cold morning air. Warmth spread through her body as she held Clementine, a broken toy, in her arms. Thoughts in her head were cloudy, there was only one thing she could think about and it was right in front of her. The fabric of her shirt running across her breasts was enough to send her over the edge. Hours she had fought, the war she had waged to return to her love, the taboo of the situation, it all fed into the warm feeling eating away at her lower half. No more waiting. Without hesitation she engulfed Clementine's mouth, her tongue was not shy as it explored its new home without restraint. Lifeless though the body was, the softness and warmth she felt as she ran her hand up Clem's shirt to caress her bare back was undeniable. After starting, anything that had been holding her back had given way to her inhibitions. With imprecise and rushed action Violet removed Clementine's jacket and tossed it behind them, it landed across the large chain with a light thud. Exposed shoulders sang to Violet as she looked over Clementine's body, she still had her shirt on but just the simple provocation of her ample flesh teased at Violet's groin. Shaking, she looked over the exposed body in front of her. Small yet muscular shoulders: the simple perfection they offered was nectar and Violet couldn't resist as her tongue found its way tracing across the smooth contour of her muscles. Thoughts of Clementine raced through her mind. Strong and capable, protective and daring, fearless and uncompromising, all the qualities of Clementine, the thought that she was hers was almost too much to bear. Blood smeared over the pristine underlayer of Clementine's clothes as Violet pressed her body against Clementine. "I wish I could be one with you" Violet whispered as she ran her hand down Clementine's arm to interlock their fingers together. Roughness and blood were all that she felt.

In the struggle to get AJ back to the school, Clementine had needed to use her walking stick much more than she had anticipated, the pain coming from her newly made peg-leg was too much for her to endure without it. In using the makeshift stick, however, Clementine had needed to put almost all of her weight, along with AJ's weight onto the support stick just to keep from falling, in order to move forward - much more painful methods were required. The thick chain wrapped around her did not help. Each step would have been like holding a stick of broken glass, the skin on her palms had almost been entirely ripped off. Violet stepped back. On the sole foot that remained, remained no sole. Her shoe had been torn to pieces and nothing of it remained. Rocks and other debris had adhered to the dried and caked on blood of her foot. Looking to the side by the gate violet finally noticed it, a small green sack. Suddenly Violet could feel her surroundings, it was as if the world had sprung into view. Slowly she walked over to the bag. Each step was like stepping over mountains. Sounds faded and her focus sharpened as she neared the sack. Carefully she stretched her arms out as if to preemptively open the bag, as she pulled apart the pieces of fabric her hand couldn't help but cover her mouth as she gasped. It was AJ, and he was alive. Violet looked over to Clementine's body and tears started to flow down her face. She had thought he was dead - It was a fleeting thought: the kind of thought you push out of your head to ignore it, but deep down in the recess of your mind you know it still exists. The lingering internal puss festers, as logic fights emotion.

More warmth than Violet had ever felt washed over her and she collapsed to the ground. Maternal instinct was a powerful thing. At the dawn of time before language or writing - surely even this core feeling must have existed.  _She fucking saved him_. Pride and lust for Clementine overwhelmed her as she orgasmed on the rough grass. It was minutes before she had the strength to get up. Clarity had returned to her, but she could feel it drifting away as thoughts of Clementine started to fill her head again. Panic washed over her, she needed to get Clementine inside the School so she could get patched up, but her helpless broken body was strangely arousing to her. Guilt briefly stung her stomach before lust devoured it.

Standing over Clementines motionless body Violet could feel her mouth physically start watering as dark ambrosial thoughts filled her mind. Kneeling down Violet put both her hands under Clementines shirt grasping her abdomen. Slowly she ran her hands up to where her armpits resided, small perfect breasts gracing the sides of her forearms. "Goodbye," Clementine said suddenly. Violets hands darted out from under Clementines shirt like she got caught with her hand in the cookie jar. Motionless and silent Violet loomed over her body and waited, she could feel every beat of her heart as the guilt slowly started to build. "Goodbye," Clementine whispered again. Violet carefully leaned in close to Clementine's face and turned her ear so she could hear better. "Goodbye...Lee." She said - a visible frown and distress forming on her face. "I'll miss you" Clementine mumbled before Violet collapsed weeping beside her. Unimaginable, having to kill the one you love. She looked over at Clementines dirty, wonderful face through her tear-soaked eyes and thought about what she had told her in the past. How killing him had changed her. It felt like Violet was going to burst, emotions overwhelmed her and the heat between her legs was starting to annoy her more than anything. Hitting the ground with her clenched fists she rose to her feet, using her anger at herself, and the people that did this as fuel to push forward. She secured AJ around her back using the makeshift sling and carefully bent over to pick Clementine up. Holding her like this, against her chest was almost too much, her knees shook, but not from the stress of weight. Trying not to think, she carried Clementine and AJ as fast as she could into the school.

A week had passed, and still, they had not seen or heard from Aasim. Clementine had rested the first few days trying to recuperate, the damage to her hands had looked worse than it had actually been, but the lacerations still looked very painful after they were cleaned up. Ruby had wrapped Clementine's hands to protect them but now she looked more mummy than human. 

With practice, Clem was walking around the school not with crutches - but a new peg leg. It looked like it was cobbled together with not only mechanical parts but a wood core, something born of necessity but also invention. It did not look clumsy or bulky but sleek and well made. Willy, Rubby and AJ had whipped it up for her, based on Aasims designs of course.  _Aasim_ , Clementine thought as her peg leg suddenly caught a stone and she fell to the ground in a plunging motion. She went to brace herself with her hands but seeing the bandages reminded her of the damage she had taken and she pulled them back at the last second slamming into the dirt face first. Violet rushed over to help her up but Clementine whacked her hand, and her help, away. Violet looked distressed. "Look, I don't need any help!" Clementine said gritting her teeth, but then realizing she had snapped at Violet her expression softened and she turned back to her. Kneeling down Violet looked into Clementine's eyes while she slowly and gently wiped the dirt from her face. "I'm sorry Violet, I - I Just...I have to find Aasim. I Failed him, Vi, all I was focused on was AJ. To be honest, Aasim never even crossed my mind." Violet could see tears start to form in Clementine's eyes but she knew they would not be allowed to fall. Reaching around Clementine's waist, Violet lifted Clem to her feet trying to be careful of her hands "Well find him, everyone is helping." Together they walked to the courtyard. 

Omar slammed his knife into the large wood table that had been set up and turned around to tend to the deer carcass hanging behind him. Aj was helping him and acting eager as always to help. Ruby, Willy, and Louis sat off to the side, Ruby looked very serious as she explained something to them and they nodded as she went on. Every now and then Louis would write something in his notebook to show her and she would respond with another five-minute explanation. 

As Clementine and Violet entered, the group all looked up at them. The sudden shift in focus was jarring and the feeling that Clementine was becoming the leader felt more apparent. Looking to the side, Clementine could see Violet's beautiful face, dirt-covered parts of it anyway. Her hair was messy on the side but it just made her like it more.  _Violet is the real leader of this group_ , Clementine thought as they walked over to their group of friends,  _I would never want to be the leader of a group, they always die._  Her gut sunk as the thought wormed its way through her head.

"Howdy there!" Ruby called out as they approached, Louis waved and Willy made a bunch of weird sounds. Clem hobbled over to the outside couch and plopped down with a small cloud of dust and a thud. Violet joined her sitting rather close. Everyone jumped as Clementine slammed her peg leg into the table in front of them. She was still unaccustomed to this prosthetic. Pain shot up her leg focusing on the point where the prosthetic met her still-healing wound. "Ok, darling?" Ruby shot at Clementine. "Yeah, still getting the hang of this." She replied downplaying the pain. Willy seemed to be full of energy and paced the area. The group talked and joked for a while before the mood grew a little more thoughtful. Ruby sat forward and got more serious than she usually was, "With this being our last supper and all shouldn't we go over the plan one more time?" Violet spat to the side and replied and an annoyed tone "Plan? What plan? Because your 'Plan' seems more like a series of wing its."   
"We should just enjoy dinner and try not to think about it too much," Clementine said looking up at the sky as evening approached. Violet shot her an annoyed look but shrugged it off.

Night started to fall. As the darkness grew, so did the fire Omar had made at the center of the courtyard. The giant makeshift grill was made of all sorts of scavenged metal but it still looked surprisingly like a grill. Into the fire Clementine gazed, entranced by the dancing flames. Her mind was blank, in a sort of haze but visions of the Ericson's raid filled her mind, the fight with Lilly, her dead bullet-riddled corpse as the boat burned down around her, Fort McCarroll... "You ok?" Willy said suddenly. Without turning or blinking Clem simply said: "Scout the area for walkers - we have no one on watch." Willy let out a giant sigh and huddled off to do as he was told. Clementine did not move. It felt like her breathing had stopped. Thoughts of what was coming tried to meander into her mind but it felt like if she just kept staring into the flame they would fade into nothingness, and they did. 

Laughing burst out between members of the group and the abrupt change in mood snapped her out of the trance. Omar had started to cook the deer and was showing AJ how to do it properly. Louis was playing cards, the non-talking kind, with Violet as Ruby chatted her up. Everyone was having fun, Clementine looked down to her bandaged hands and thought about Aasim. He had been missing for just a week, but they had already distanced themselves from the thought that he was dead. She couldn't blame them, she did the same. Encouraged it in some cases, but this was different. Leadership had started to show itself to her, its dark and twisted form, its true visage. 

Pushing the foul feeling of failure aside Clementine walked carefully over to Omar and let the smell of the cooking deer fill her nose. Immediately she could feel her mouth start to water with anticipation. "How are your hands doing Clem?" Omar asked as he prodded different cuts of meat.

  
"Could be better, but not half as bad as my back feels" She said jokingly.

  
AJ sat off to the side washing some utensils in a bucket of water. He looked over to make sure Clem was ok, and after a quick glance returned to his work. Food was not Clementines strong point and even with Omar's random willingness to preach about it this evening, it was difficult for her to pay attention let alone learn anything from the book of cooking facts he was throwing at her. Nodding, she left him to his devices and went to sit with the others. Violet hastily made room for Clementine to sit beside her. And she did. Time whizzed by as Louis somehow managed to trick laughs out of them even without talking. His comedy had taken a much more physical form, and even his garbled speech wasn't off-limits. After a long bout of laughter involving a headless walker, Omar signaled that dinner was ready. Willy had just finished his patrol and together with AJ and Omar, they carried the heavy platter of meat to their now small group of people. Placed on the table, It looked like a feast in the small company they had. Sticking her hand forward Violet tried to grab a piece off the platter but before she had a firm grip on it Clementine batted her hand away with the back of her bandage. "I'm going to say a few words," Clementine said. Everyone got quiet as Clementine sat up to give her speech.

"I was the new girl, but now - more than ever, it feels like I'm becoming the leader," Clementine said as she looked into Violet's eyes.  "Aasim is gone, because of me. Because of us", She said motioning to Violet and AJ "I'm tired of losing friends to evil fucking bastards that bring their stupid problems to our home. People that end up taking the lives of the friends we care about. This  _is_  our last supper, enjoy it but know why we are even doing it in the first place. Remember whos memory we celebrate, whos loss weighs on us. We will have justice on Mick, and whatever group he serves for the foul trial he put us through! This attack against our group can't just be forgotten!" She said as she slammed her fist into the table without thinking, red starting to stain the bandages that lined it. Ruby and Willy looked a bit shaken and withdrawn like they wanted to say something but at this point had given up trying. Clementine just continued forward "The one thing we know is that Mick is not with the Caravan group. So what are we going to do? The only thing we can. We are going to put all our cards on the table. We are going to suck it up and make contact with the Caravan group. We will get their help, or force them to help if we have to." The last words slipped out but she meant it. She pushed the meat platter forward finally allowing access. With the grace of watterbuffilo, the group dug into the platter. It was easy to watch the group eat, to be fed and taken care of. To be happy and content. Even facing this horror show, they stood strong. Pride in her own group swelled inside her. "Not hungry?" Violet said as she tried to feed Clementine a forkful of meat playfully. Clem took a bite unwillingly and forced it down. She gave Violet a half-smile as she brushed the hair out of her face. The bad feeling in her gut wouldn't go away.

The day after Aasim went missing the group had scavenged the forest for clues. It was not hard for Clementine to trace her steps back to the place she had been held captive. It was very little time before the group found the location where all the captives had been held. Being in close proximity to each other made it easy. In the blackness of night, it was hard to tell where they were, but here in the light, everything was exposed. While everyone was examing the central area for clues Clementine circled the outer area, she kept finding traces of Micks tracks. The location and direction of them perplexed her. At first, she had thought he was leaving her dummy tracks to keep her from finding her way to his camp, but the more she looked the more it was apparent that wasn't the case. Each of them, Vi, AJ, Aasim, and Clem had all been set up in a circle around a central point. Micks tracks were abundant in this area and went in every direction. Dead walkers also left clues as to the locations where Mick had stopped. Based on the direction of the tracks, the wear on the ground in certain spots, and the corpses of the dead, Clementine could only come to one conclusion: he had been constantly watching them. Confusion, as well as confirmation, jetted through her. She knew he had been watching, she  _felt_  it, the question is -  _why? Why not just kill them? What was this sick fucks game?_  She bent down and touched a spot on the ground, it was dirt that had been compressed. Kneeling down at the spot she had touched put her behind a large bush, but she had just enough room to see over it. She looked carefully past the shrubbery to the clearing in front of her. What she saw sent chills down her spine: the bloody scene of the walker she had beaten with a rock, the small wooden chest she had discarded out of anger, it was the place she had woken up, bound to death.  _He was this close to me,_  She thought as her heart started to speed up. They searched the forest for four days straight looking for Aasim. They found nothing.

It was mid-morning when the group geared up to go confront the Caravan and ask for help. It was oddly quiet as everyone got ready and formed up as a group. With everything on Clementine's mind, getting to the Caravan was irritatingly quick. Since they had given up trying to stay hidden from the caravaners the walk was much shorter. Fear pecked at the back of Clementine's mind as the caravan drew closer. Pain shot up her hand as it brushed against Violet and she winced. Weeks would need to pass before her hands were fully healed. She was starting to feel sick. Closer and closer they got to the Stonehenge of cars, and each step caused her heart to get faster and faster. If she could, she would've started running towards them as fast as she could just to get this feeling to go away, but she doubted it was even possible with this new peg leg. Ruby had a rifle with her, one of the few times Clem had ever seen her with a gun. And it showed. She looked like a 'walker out of the herd'. Even with her lack of skill, Clem was happy the group had started to step up. Willy was beside her flipping his wood knife around but Clem could clearly see the pistol shoved into the back of his pants from her viewing angle. 'Chairles' Louis' weapon sat comfortably on his shoulder, blood from a recent kill dripping off some of the stray nails. Even though he had seemed like a lazy guy when they first got there, he had really tried to be a bigger help to the group after the Delta attacked. The only person not with them was Omar. They needed someone to watch the school and to be honest Clem had no idea if she could even convince him to come, he was pretty mad when they decided this was the course of action they were going to take. He blamed Clem and AJ for Aasims death and said it would have been better if they just never even left to set traps in the first place. When he found out they had tried to skirt by the vote and it had caused so much trouble there was no stoping his tirade, and she did not want to. She quietly sat and took every word of it, tried even to commit it to memory, but sadly most of it had already escaped her. Guilt slammed her as more thoughts of failure filled her mind, memories not forgotten.  

'BANG-'

A gunshot screeched into the dirt in front of them as reality whooshed back in to focus.

  
"Stop where you are!"

  
"Don't move or I sware I'll kill you where you stand" the young man yelled as he pointed a rifle at them from behind a car. He was quickly joined by two other men also holding rifles. From this distance it was easy to see the weapons, they were high grade and well maintained. They almost looked new. Clementine and the others knew the drill, and they had made preparations for this. All of them stopped as instructed.

  
"Drop your weapons!"

  
They dropped the weapons in their hands, as instructed.

  
"Now don't fucking move a muscle or it will be the last move you ever make." The young man said as the two other men walked over and examined the group.

It was a thorough search, a bit too thorough for Violet's liking and she blushed as she yelled obscenities at the fat man searching her. Clementine would be mad too if her mind wasn't elsewhere. After a few minutes of searching, the young man that was on watch came out slowly. He was wearing a beanie, but his clothes were all very well kept. His shirt was clean and over it, he wore a button-up with a well-pressed collar, every button had been fastened - even the one closest to his neck.

"What do you want?" He asked much more calmly than before.

  
"We want to talk," Clem said without looking away from the ground.

  
"Talk?" he said in confusion looking around carefully.

  
He leaned in close, kind of by her ear and said in a not quite whisper "Not a whole lot of people want to 'talk' these days." he said as he rose back up.

  
Clementine looked up into his eyes, the man could see the coldness in them, death. He knew those eyes, but said nothing and showed nothing. "Well, I want to talk. The question is if you'll listen?" Turning around with little more than a breath, the man walked off. Anxiety filled her as she looked at the automatic weapons the other two men held, visions of the Russian group filled her mind, Arvo and his sister. The drugs she had stolen from him. The bullets as they whizzed by her head in that horrific firefight. She looked to the side instinctively searching for Kenny. When she realized what she was doing the tinge of sadness colored her anxiety. The bullet wound on her shoulder ached and she ran her finger along the indentation where it had healed.

After what seemed like an hour the young man returned with yet another man, this was the man they had seen earlier when they were scouting the area. A long shotgun seemed to have a permanent home on his left shoulder and fingerless black gloves adorned his hands. A trucker hat that strangely reminded her of Kenny sat on his head. The man was rather big and his size seemed to match his position in the group. From this distance, it was easy to see that something was in his lower lip.

"What did y'all need?" he said spitting black.

  
Slightly disgusted Clementine replied, "I need to talk to your leader, it's important"

  
"Well ur lookin at one of um" he said as he adjusted his shotgun, "So git to it."

  
"Out here? In the open?" Clem replied looking around the open field.

  
"Yarp" the burly man said as he waited patiently.

  
After a moment of silence, Clementine gave a short explanation of the current situation. She told them details on the schools scouting operations against them, as well how they were captured and tortured by a man named Mick. Nodding along, the man listened to what they had to say. After Clementine was done he thought for a second before nodding once more. He stuck his free hand out for clementine to shake, she pulled her hands up to show they were heavily bandaged and the guy shrugged and turned around. "I'm Dinkle," he said back turned to them, using his thumb he motioned to the Clean shaven man with the button-up shirt to his side. "Tis' is Christian" then pointing to his other side using his pointer and middle finger "These r' Guss and Hammond."  
"Follah me" He said, gruffly leading the way.

  
The group followed and AJ stayed close to Clementine's leg. In order to get to the inner circle within the compound, they had to hop over the hood of a heavily modified car. It almost looked like a makeshift tank from here and hopping over it without hurting themselves was actually rather difficult, if not quick. Inside the semicircle of cars was much bigger than she had originally thought. Although much of the space was being taken up with various necessities. Chairs lined certain areas and it was pretty easy for her to tell where the kitchen, bathroom, and storage area might be. Two women sat in a corner talking with each other giggling at something, but as they entered the camp they grew more serious and started to whisper to each other. "Tats Daisy an' Mal" he said motioning over to the girls. "We ave' one more, but e' is real sick right now, I'll introduce y'all to m' later." Clementine could see the man's gaze rest on one of the vans, or what she had thought was a van, but from this angle, she could see it was a heavily modified ambulance. It had so much armor and modifications that it was almost impossible to tell, save for the dim dirty cross on this side of the vehicle. Guss and Hammond had collected their weapons and stored them in the trunk of one of the armored cars off to the side, locking it to make sure they were secure. Clem noted the location, this is something that would be impossible for her to forget. Dinkle took them to the strange-looking van with all sorts of bizarre tubes and electrical wires coming out of it, a small hum came from the back window. Barrels were attached to the back in multiple places with hoses going every which way - along with the strong smell of gasoline. Dinkle slammed the side door of the makeshift van with his giant fist a bunch of times and waited. After a strangely long wait, he did it again. Right before he slammed a third time an old man with frazzled white hair and a labcoat stumbled out of the van holding his head "what the fuck do you want?" he said, eyes half-closed to Dinkle, seemingly not noticing all the new people standing in his camp.

  
Clementine explained to the man everything she had told Dinkle, and despite being the "brain" of the operation he seemed to take more time to process it than Dinkle. "So? You want help I take it? Sorry but we are already full up on favors." the man in a lab coat said snarkly rubbing his forehead like he was trying to work a knot out of it. "I'm Zran Kiscche, but everyone around here calls me 'Z'." He said not even attempting a handshake. "What do you mean? Full on favors?" Clementine said, "look, if we don't help each other, both our groups are going to die - I heard him talking about your group when we first met him. There is no way they don't know you're here"   
"Then it's a good thing we're leaving tomorrow," Z said with a carefree tone. Violet couldn't take it any longer, they had all decided to let Clementine talk to the group but this was the last straw. "Leaving? We need to work together to get these fucks! There has to be more than fucking one based on how the creep was talking. You are going to just ignore them?" The words came out like venom.   
"Let me show you something," Z said as he walked around the side of his van. "You know what this is?" he said pointing at the wires and barrels sticking out the back of the van. The Ericson kids in unity shook their heads  _no_. "It's a refinery," he said pointing at it, "it takes crude oil and converts it into usable gasoline and diesel. Do you understand? A mobile refinery. Can you even wrap your little heads around that value?" He said as he poked Violet in the middle of her forehead. "Not a day goes by that we don't fear assault or raids for this precious philosopher's stone." Clementine quietly listened to his speech but was perplexed as to why this man they had just met would spill their secrets so willingly and suddenly - but judging by the way he was moving she guessed he was not totally sober or thinking straight. "For the brains of this operation you sure seem stupid," she said without thinking. Z's eyes went big in anger and he shook his head as he leaned down to get in clementines face. "Look here you little shit" he said jabbing his finger into her shoulder, "I'm smarter than all of you little fucks combined I guarantee you that." he said as he turned around and gave the group the finger "Do what you want Dinkle, but we are full, I'm tired of taking in stragglers," he said before climbing back into his van and slamming the door.

"That went well," Ruby said in a snarky tone. AJ looked depressed and Louis looked worried. "Everythings going to be fine, we have the backup plan as well," Clementine said but Louis just looked more distraught at the thought. As they stood bickering the two girls they saw earlier came over to introduce themselves. The older of the two was Mal, she had white hair with a few streaks of brown that were hard to see even in this light. She wore a blue denim jacket and had a stern demeanor. The edges of the jacket were worn out like it had gone through two world wars. Giant military boots were about the only thing about her that stood out. At her side was Daisy, she looked like she was younger than Clementine. Soot was the color of her hair, the blackest black Clementine had ever seen, it was long and straight with the ends being cut perfectly flat. She wore a short skirt, slightly formal and made with thick black cloth. The collar was adorned with a gold scorpion pin. A canine tooth was noticeable from the side of her mouth. "Hi I'm Daisy," she said cheerfully shaking hands with everyone in the group. "It's good to meet you, Clementine," she said as she held her hand out for her to shake, something that was obviously impossible to do at the moment. "Oh sorry, I'm such a ditz," Daisy said as she withdrew her hand and smiled. Mal walked beside Daisy and lit a cigarette taking a long drag off it before she started talking, "Daisy is such a sweetheart, we saved her about two months ago and she has been with us ever since" Daisy blushed and looked to the side "Oh you're too kind Mal, I just try to do my part for the group"  
"Isn't Daisy a flower?" AJ said randomly looking into her eyes "Sure is bud" she replied "But some people think of it as more of a weed. We will just ignore them won't we?" AJ smiled and nodded. Dinkle pat Daisy on the shoulder with his massive hand a few times, "Daisy is actually a huge help around here, she has made forging for food much easier, she is a natural. By the way, I'm sorry about Z, he has good days...and bad ones." he said looking over to the now-closed van with a face full of sorrow.

Christian had gone back to his watch post, which was a very good thing indeed because just then he came running back to Dinkle. "Sir, I think there is a flash herd coming. It was moving slow but the gunshots and noise probably drew them this direction. They are coming along the road" Dinkle looked unphased, though he did deliberate for a moment, standing in the cliche thinker pose before finally looking over to the group "Well I reckon we better deal wit dis" he said spitting a giant black wad to the ground. Slowly they walked to the center of the camp where a machine about the size of a generator stood. It was in the shape of a box with some sort of large stack coming off the top where disks were held.

"What's that thing?" Willy said as he jumped at the chance to touch whatever parts of it he could. Annoyed Dinkle pushed him to the side to set the machine up. "Ever' done Skeet Shooting?" He asked with a bewildered face.

"Never even heard of it," Willy replied trying to figure out how the machine worked. "Tis' machine here, once powered, shoots clay disks o'er two-hundred feet. Normally they don't go tat far but Z did some fancy electrical work to it and now it's better than ever!" he said as he took the jumper-cable like power connectors and attached them to a nearby car battery. Sparks erupted as the connection was made. The machine hummed to life.

"Normally you shoot um' out of teh' sky, but Z modified the disks to make a loud whistle that draws walkers" Willy made a giant O shape with his mouth as he hung on to every one of Dinkle's words.

"And this is how you fir-" Clementine held her hand out right away "You can't fire it." Dinkle stood back shocked "What do you mean?" he said questioning her motives.

"You have shared a lot with us so I'll share something with you," Clementine pointed in the same direction as the machine was pointed, "Our home is that way, we have been fighting the herds you have sent our way all this time." Dinkle looked genuinely shocked. A range of emotions went across his face but they settled on sadness. "I really ad' no idea, but tis' teh only direction we can fire it, we'r in eh' valley, there is eh' large draft that flows through ere', these disks are light and if we fire um into the wind the distance is cut by over alf'." Clementine crossed her arms "Find another option then, we have friends there right now" This was a lie, of course, Omar was the only one at the school, but she still did not trust anyone here, she never trusted new groups. Better safe than sorry.

  
"Teh only way we could probably fire it," Dinkle said as he bent down and took some sand from the road and let it fall from his hand so he could witness the wind direction. "Is down teh road, but that would bring the herd right through us instead of curving dem away. We ave' done it before, but it's risky." Ruby and the others pleaded with Dinkle but it did not take much for him to agree to change the direction the of thrower. Dinkle had explained to them that since the heard would have to go through the caravan they would need to re-apply their "defensive coating" before they could fire the thrower - and they would need to hurry. To Clementine's surprise, this coating was actually walker guts smeared along the outer barrier of their camp. With a name like "defensive coating" Clem thought Z had to have come up with this. Maybe these guys were smarter than she gave them credit for, this Z guy seemed to really have some genuine ingenuity. Now that she looked at the outer layer of car-Stonehenge she could notice the smear of walker guts lining it, along with the occasional walker head or body part impaled to a car. It took longer than the group had thought but with the help of Mal and Daisy, it was done before the herd made it to them. With a buzzing whiz the disk flew through the air, Dinkle fired a few just to be sure then shut the machine off. The whistling disks doing their job of drawing the walkers away. 

Moans of the walkers howled out around them but the walker guts seemed to be doing  _something_  and they continued on past the caravan. The modified cars blocked the view to most of the walkers due to their wall-like construction, but they could still see the heads of most of the walkers, they tried to stay low as to not draw attention from the herd. Next to one of the busses was a large sleeping area where the group had congregated, cots lined the area but not enough for the whole group so some of them sat on blankets and makeshift padding instead. It was not comfortable. Dinkle told them they would probably have to stay the night, at least until the herd passed. Everyone pretty much agreed. They all joked and shot the shit as quietly as they could before night hit.

Moonlight woke Clementine up, the bright majestic orb floating directly above her head. It was almost entirely full. The moaning walkers were still bashing into the walls of the base but the density of the heard was significantly less than when they had fired disks out of the thrower. Clem looked around and all her friends were asleep. She leaned over and gave AJ a kiss on the forehead, then violet: a kiss on the cheek. Clem rubbed her eyes and looked around. Everything looked normal. Dinkle had gone off to sleep in his truck.

*clink* *clink*  _What a weird sound_ , then it happened again, behind her. Slowly she got up. Moans of the walkers rumbled her bones and the random slams against the outer cars almost made her jump every time they happened. Closer and closer she moved. A figure in the distance stood fumbling with the lock of a car-trunk. The trunk their weapons were being stored in. Carefully and quietly Clem hid behind some barrels trying to catch a glimpse of who it might be. Even in this light, it was hard to see who it was, she needed to get closer. Inch by inch she made her way to the trunk, each step made a new cacophony of sounds that dissuaded her next step. Be she made it nevertheless. Howling winds prodded the trees near the road and leaves blew through her loose hair. The trunk of the car clicked and the shadowy figure reached inside withdrawing a pistol. With a silent click the trunk closed and the figure turned around. The moon radiated light giving the shadowy figure an otherworldly hue, her back hair fell down her face in oddly precise parallel lines. Her eyes were not visible but her mouth easily was. Clementine could hear the click as she took the safety off the gun,  _her_  gun. "I know you're there Clementine," She said in a low whispering voice that scratched at her like a chalkboard. Clementine sat behind the barrel.  _This has to be a dream_ , she thought as she sat with her eyes closed. "I can see your empty cot from here," The voice said, now closer than before.  _Wake up, wake up, wake up_ , Clementine thought to herself as she sat behind the barrel trying to stay hidden. 

Dew formed on the ground around her as she sat motionlessly. Her breath was shaky but quiet. "Tell me about them" a voice whispered into her ear. Clementine jumped up, startled by the sudden closeness of the voice. As she turned, her own gun met her face. "Tell me," the dark figure said as she pushed the gun into Clementine's temple.  _Her own gun_. The death of Omid filled her mind and the taste of failure lined her lips once again. Nothing but a frown adorned Clementine's face. She wanted control back.

  
Clem did the only thing she could think of and spit in her face. The sudden projectile of saliva startled the dark figure but not enough to pull the trigger. To Clementine's surprise, the figure got even closer to her, the moon showing the Cheshire grin of her face clearly now. It was Daisy, she slowly used her tongue to lick away the saliva on the side of her face. "What the fuck-" Clementine said as panic started to fill her. "Fickle Mick told me a lot about you, but I did not believe it. Him praising a cripple is pretty strange but it's kind of a turn on for me" she said as she grabbed Clementine's peg leg and pulled up. The pain was significant. "Though, you are a bit of a disappointment so far," Daisy said taping the gun to the side of her head playfully. "Now tell me," She said pushing the gun up under Clementine's jaw "What made you?" Clementine looked confused "What the fuck are you talking about?" She said.

  
The girl sighed, took a deep breath and like she was explaining something to a child she said very slowly, "Who, died? who did you kill? What atrocities did you commit getting to this point?" Clementine was about to say  _why would I ever tell you_  when Daisy put the gun to Clem's lips in a silencing motion.

"Shhh, I'll tell you, because it's always the same. Someone you loved. Someone that cared about you more than their own life was lost, but not just them, everyone you cared about was taken from you. Am I getting close?" She said mockingly waving the gun around, "I'll tell you a secret Clementine, because I know we are the same" She leaned up close to Clem to make sure she could hear her, with a demonic whisper she said with a smile: "Every group I'm with dies." Clementine did not know what came over her but she wanted more than anything to kill this girl right here, right now. _She is nothing like me_ , Clem thought as rage started to fill her. Clear-headed thinking was out the window and her body moved on its own. She reached out to take the gun, she was fast, but this girl was somehow faster, Clementine managed to grab her wrist but right as she made contact Daisy had used her legs to pull Clem off-balance slamming her into the ground. Clementine had never been tripped like that before. Daisy had used the weight Clementine put into grabbing her wrist against her. "Did I hit a nerve?" Daisy said looking down at Clem, who was laying on her back. Coughing and trying to get her breath to return, Clem sat up. "How do you know all this?" she said gasping for air.

"Because I know a monster when I see one," Daisy replied. "and I can prove it," she said with a grin. "I have another secret for you but I'll only tell you if you ask nicely."

 _She likes the feeling of control_ , Clementine thought. Then somewhere deep in her mind, in a place she did not want to acknowledge she thought,  _Maybe we are the same_.  _No_.

It was a struggle but Clementine knew she needed to give the girl what she wanted at this moment. "May you please tell me how you can prove that I am a monster?" The words felt like dirt spewing from her mouth and she regretted saying them as soon as they exited her mouth. But the damage had already been done, the wheel of fate spun. Daisy did not say a word, just pointed over to the ambulance they had been shown earlier. "Go take a look, I'll wait here."

  
_What the fuck is her game?_  Clem thought as she walked over to the ambulance, what could be in there that could possibly prove that I'm a monster? Every bone in her body told her not to go, she knew she was being manipulated but everything was so strangely accurate that her own curiosity needed to be sated. Each step was like wading through mud, as she approached the door to the ambulance she slowed down. Quietly she opened the door.  _Click_ , the latch slid to the side as the automatic lights came on and the door opened.

Her eyes had to be playing a trick on her. A stinging pain radiated from her shoulder as she looked down at the gurney. It was the Russian. Arvo. He was sleeping and looked sick. Gunshots from the past rang in her ears as automatic weapons fired. All of the supplies he had taken from them before he tried to kill her.  _Kill me_. The thought echoed within her as if each reverberation amplified the pain in her chest. This was something she did not know even affected her this way, an invisible shackle of fear made manifest. Arvo awoke to Clementine's bandage wrapped hands around his throat. The pain that radiated up her arms was almost unbearable but she  _enjoyed_  it. As she gripped tighter the pain became more intense, blood stained the bandages around her hands and the pain became euphoric. Clementine couldn't see her own face but her victim could, clearly. Each time her grip became tighter, so too did her Cheshire grin grow. As the life slowly left his body she did not feel guilt or remorse, only joy in that moment of catharsis. Even when he took he last breath she continued to squeeze.

Thoughts had left Clementine's mind, she just wanted to cause Daisy pain. She did not care about manipulation or how alike they were, all she wanted was for her to die like Arvo. Lost and gone forever.  
Soft clapping was coming from Daisy as Clementine walked toward her, hands dripping blood. "Wow, I hoped you would do it, but for it to turn out this perfect? I see now, I see why Fickle Mick likes you." The words just made her feel worse. Cocky and arrogant, so sure of herself. It pissed Clementine off. Sliding her thumb down the side of her jacket, clementine felt the loose seam where she had hidden a small knife. She had learned from when Lilly captured her that she would never be without a weapon again. Easily it slid into her palm, it's next stop, Daisy's neck.

Clementine walked slowly toward Daisy. Almost walker like - Clem lugged herself toward Daisy, each step swaying her back and forth like a metronome. Slow and steady she approached. Daisy had pointed the gun at her. When she had done this was unclear, but Clementine did not care.  _Fire it at me, I dare you_ , she thought as she walked at Daisy, her hazel eyes focused and intent on ending life. This threw Daisy off guard, but only for a moment. Right before Clementine could reach her, she started to laugh, and not a little quiet laugh, a giant maniacal laugh. It would surely wake everyone in this camp up, why would she start laughing?  _I'm going to kill this bitch._  She picked up speed and readied the makeshift shiv to find a home in her neck. Just feet away, just a few more feet and her blade would be in range.

-BANG-

The suddenness of the shot startled her, but the lack of pain was even more of a shock. She had not fired at Clementine, she had blown a hole through her own forearm.  _Why?_  Clementines question was soon answered as the entire camp suddenly formed a circle around them. All of a sudden Clementine could hear the moan of walkers again, she had snapped out of whatever trance she was in and reality was swimming back with force. The voices around her had been distorted but they started to clear up as she regained her senses. "Ahh help, help! She's crazy, she tried to kill me!" Daisy said as she rolled around on the ground clutching her forearm, blood spewing everywhere. Guns, all around her, all pointed  _at her._  Clementine could sware she saw Daisy smile. But if she had, it was gone now, replaced with writhing and pain. Clementine was bloody, beaten, and this traitor was going to get away with it.  _I wonder if this is how Lilly felt when she accidentally killed Doug_.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you ware wondering what pill each person had It would probably be closest to these, though this is a fictional world and I took some liberties:
> 
> Clementine: Benzodiazepine  
> Aasim: Probably close to PCP  
> AJ: LSD  
> Violet: Aphrodisiac  
> Fickle Mick: MDMA
> 
> If you find a typo please let me know.


	4. Finale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clementine does her best to escape a dangerous situation.

 Clementine sat and looked out the rotten window, a single dying oak tree gracing her view. The dingy backyard of the old Savannah house more of a sad addition to the tree than a contrast.  Goosebumps shot across her skin as the chill of the Georgia air washed over her, though she felt they came more from the dread that emanated from the waning tree. Dust and mold feathered down from the ceiling but the smell was actually quite nice. Old wood and furniture may have contributed to that. Lee walked up behind her and placed his hand on her shoulder, the sudden distraction from the tree startled her and she slightly jumped from the surprise of it. 

  
"I'm sorry sweet pea, I didn't mea-"   
Clementine cut him off before he could finish.  
"It's fine, I was just distracted," She said without turning around to look at him.

  
Kneeling down at the base of the window seat Lee looked at the back of Clementine and waited. It was obvious to him that Clementine just needed a moment to herself.

It seemed like an eternity before she spoke.

  
"Why am I here now? At this place? I hate it here." She looked down at the stripped seats, guilt and sadness filled her heart. _If there was any of her heart left_ , she thought.   
"You know why you're here, it's always the same Clementine," Lee said as he sat motionless behind her. 

  
She started to cry as she looked out the dingy window, "I'm tired of fighting Lee. I just want it to stop."  
Lee looked at her quietly without saying anything, the only sound a slight clink from the gun holstered in the back of his pants.

  
Silence filled the room but Clementine broke through it with frustration, "You wanted me to grow up and live a normal life, I know that, and I have tried. But every time I start to get a family again, they are taken from me!" she said slamming her fist into the firm cushion below her. Clementine's eyes had not left the tree as she emptied her heart to Lee. Suddenly she started to claw at the window, the thing seemed to be rotted shut and forcing it to open the natural way seemed impossible, but she did not care. Her nails screeched against the windowpane. Frustration overtook her and she abandoned her task of getting to the tree and replaced it with fighting an easier target. Turning around Clementine started to yell at Lee, venting frustrations she did not even know she had. The culmination of it ended on Ben though. 

  
"You know why I hate this place, Lee? Because it's when it finally clicked for me. What this 'life' was. The night I saw you drop Ben to his death I finally understood it completely. When you killed the St. John brothers, that made sense. They were evil. But what is 'evil' Lee? Is dropping one of our family members to their death, evil?" She said in such anger that spittle flung from her mouth.  
"I did it to protect us," Lee said softly as he looked up at her. "You know what he did, you know the mistakes he had made."  
Clementine looked at him and attacked him as only a child could do to a parent. 

  
"You sound a lot like Carver there Lee. He told me I would be the one to leed the sheep, maybe he was right."

  
Lee sighed and she could see tears starting to form in his eyes. "Clementine. He betrayed our group. He sold us out to bandits without telling us just for a chance to get his friend back. He let them know when it was safe to attack, knowingly or unknowingly. He even lied when we confronted him in the RV. Most of the group only found out once we got to Savannah."

  
He stood up from his crouching position, he towered over Clementine.   
"He left you to die, sweetpea," Lee said as Clementine looked down in shame. "Chuck gave his life to save you, and he died for it. That's how this world is now. I tried to shield you from it, but Chuck knew better. He opened my eyes. Ben was a liability and at the time we knew there were limited seats on Kenny's boat. I did what I thought was right. I'm sorry Clementine."

  
"And what about Duck? Did you shoot him or make Kenny do it?!" She yelled at him, the suddenness and abruptness of the question knocking Lee back.  
Lee just looked down at her, silent.

  
Clementine reached up and grabbed his collar and pulled him close "Kenny told me you helped him, Who shot him?!" Lee did not respond. Clementine fell to her knees releasing her grip on his collar as she collapsed crying. The day Duck died still resonated with her. She could still hear the gunshot in the distance. A second one a short while later before Kenny and Lee returned. Clementine had never seen Kenny like that before. Utterly broken. 

  
"You made him kill Duck didn't you?" She said, her face pointing down, shrouded by the shadow of Lee.  
Still, only silence radiated from him. 

  
"I never told you while I was alive, so I can't now, you know that."  
Weeping Clementine looked up at Lee "Yeah...I know. You are not even real. You are dead. I killed you." The words came out hollow but the release caused her tears to flow even more powerfully. "I hate being alone Lee, I hate it so much. But I hate having to lose my family over and over again even more. I don't think I can handle it again. I can't do it" 

  
"Then don't lose them, girl. Save them. Protect them. I know you can do it. I know you can build the future we saw together." He said as he looked her in the eyes trying to hold in his tears. He bent down and hugged her. She could feel his warmth as he embraced her, she felt safe. She did not want it to end. Slowly she felt that warmth fade as the chill of the air brought her goosebumps back.

  
Lee was gone.

  
She could hear footsteps outside the door as she sat on the dusty rug. Each creak of the floorboard had force behind it as the sounds grew closer. Her tears had stopped and the goosebumps on her arm had spread to her neck and back. Her whole body was on alert. She instinctively reached for her knife but it was not there. Under the door, she could see the shadow of a pair of boots. She backed up behind the desk near her as the loud sound of creaking wood emanated from the hallway outside. Slowly the doorknob turned as the door flung open. Kenny stood there, crowbar in hand, and a bloody red eye covered by a patch. 

  
Blood dripped from the crowbar as he stood there. Bits and pieces of fleshy matter dropped from its curve making a quiet splat as they hit the ground. 

"Stop hiding like a coward Clem, it's time to get to work." He tossed her the crowbar and she caught it effortlessly, the blood from the handle flowed unnaturally over her hands as she looked down at it. The harder she clenched it, the more blood that seemed to flow out of it. 

 

 

 

       The dream of Savannah faded to red as she woke up on the ground of a dark room, head pounding. Her eyes couldn't adjust to the lack of light but she knew what she had to do. 

 

**Earlier that day:**

 

  Rays of light started to trickle in over the horizon. The Caravan group had surrounded Clementine, but not just them, the Ericson kids as well. AJ had taken up a spot right next to Clementine. His dagger out ready to defend her. The other Ericson kids, however, were not so quick to jump to her side. She was surrounded and Daisy was screaming in pain. Dinkle had his shotgun pointed right at Clementine's head at close distance and she did not want to test his accuracy. The door of the makeshift trailer slammed open and Z stumbled out of his 'cave'. He was visibly intoxicated. Quickly, he ran his hand through his white hair and checked that his tattered lab coat was straight. Pushing people aside he forced his way into the inner circle almost stumbling on a rock. 

  
"What's going on out here?!" Z said looking over the scene.

Clementine started to talk but Dinkle cut her off. "Dis one ere shot Daisy," he said motioning with his shotgun. With a look of utter disgust, Clementine glared at Daisy, though she doubted she could see her through her crying act. What seemed like hundreds of ideas raced through her mind. The hurricane of thoughts was overwhelming and the gravity of the situation made her stomach sink. A coherent plan couldn't form in her head, Clementine was still in shock over her recent run-in with Arvo. Burning pain radiated not only from her mangled hands but also the scar from the bullet Arvo had almost killed her with. Looking down the world around her seemed to fade away - only her shaking hands, a bloody mess of bandages stained red by blood, stood out vibrant against the backdrop of her mind. 

"She is full of bullshit!" Clementine yelled, pointing an accusing finger at Daisy, but the look of everyone around her pushed her back. This was not like her situation with Marlon, she could feel it inside of her, she was scared. 

Daisy looked up at the group around her. Black hair flowed like smooth waterfalls over her face and puppy dog eyes peered out. She looked like an injured school girl. 

  
"I-I--I woke up late last night, and I caught C-Clementine sneaking into the medical station. S-She killed him." Daisy said as tears filled her eyes. "I caught her...m-murdering Arvo!"   
Clementine gritted her teeth in anger, there was no way out of this, she fucked up. 

"She killed arvo!?" The caravan group seemed to utter in unison. Even the Ericson kids seemed to buy into her words. They were not wrong or fully lies though. She _killed_ Arvo. This Daisy was weaving lies into truth and manipulating two entire groups of people with ease. Manipulated her with ease...

Anger, jealousy, rage, it all boiled to the top, Clementine could not contain it. Guns? Weapons? Death? She did not care, all she wanted was to kill Daisy. Just erase the problem as she did with everything else. Clementine rushed at Daisy and wrapped her mangled hands around her neck as she did with Arvo. She squeezed as hard as she could but just barely made out a subtle laugh masquerading as a gasp. Dinkle ripped Clementine off of Daisy effortlessly with a single hand, shotgun resting on his shoulder.

With good intentions, the Ericson kids tried to defuse the situation but their history with AJ and Clementine made it less than effective. Z seemed completely out of it and tried to shut the situation down multiple times without success, his inebriation clearly contributing to the chaos. Time wound on slowly and out of sync for Clementine. Adrenaline was flooding her system, numbing the pain in her hands, and making her head foggy. Guilt over what she had done to Arvo was non-existent, but the consequences of the action echoed in her head. Thoughts of Daisy spread like a virus irritating and frustrating her. _How does she know so much about me? How could she manipulate me?_   Radiated around Clementine's mind. Nothing made sense. 

Like an answer to her question, a huge _explosion_ rocked everyone from their feet. A giant plume of smoke and combustion filled the air above the now destroyed camper of Zran. Something had caused the refining station to explode. Smoke clouded the air above the circle of vehicles as the shockwave of the explosion radiated away. The reality of the situation instantly became clear to all in the camp. Walkers were coming. 

An enormous wall of fire burned in the now gaping hole of machinery. Their wall was no-longer whole. Bumbling to his feet Z spun around and gasped at the wreckage. Years of work, scourging, tinkering, trial, and error. All of it went up in smoke. His flask was loosely held in his flaccid hand, It dropped to the ground with hollow tink.

Clementine thought she could see him mouth the words "my home" but before she could even make a plan or get a handle on the situation something unbelievable happened. Something she couldn't even believe she was seeing. Without moving or showing a facial expression of any kind Clementine rubbed her eyes with what little clean bandage she could find.

It was real.

A giant hawk, crimson black with bits of white around the trailing edge of its wings. Talons the size of her fist gleamed in the sun as it started to rise. She would have been lost in the beauty of the situation if the hawk wasn't currently ripping Zran's eyes out.

The hawk flew around Z's upper body as he fruitlessly tried to whack it away but without a proper weapon it was pointless. Dinkle aimed his shotgun at the bird, but without a good shot, it was impossible for him to fire without blowing Z's head off. Blood and feathers were flying everywhere and soon Z was reduced to clutching his bloody head and assuming a fetal position. Dinkle started to run over to help Zran but before he even got two steps a gunshot blasted out behind them striking Dinkle in the back of the leg. Lumbering to the ground Dinkle dropped his shotgun, more out of shock than pain. Dinkle looked up at his friend as the hawk's talons dug into his neck ripping out giant chunks of flesh. Any hope of saving Z was gone. With a hint of pride and satisfaction, the hawk flew away, chunks of flesh still hanging from its clenched talons. 

Everything was happening so fast, it brought her back to when Lilly assaulted the school. But at least then they knew she was coming, they could prepare, this was on a whole other level. This was planned, coordinated, executed. Clementine looked around, there was something going on here and she needed to figure out what. Guss and Hammond, two of the muscle that had accompanied Dinkle when they first confronted the caravan, ran to a heavily armored car off to the side. Clementine assumed they were getting weapons. She was right. A plan started to form in her head, while they are being distracted by whatever this was, she could steal a weapon from them and somehow find a way to escape. It would be improvised as they went, you know, _the normal._ She grinned to herself and looked down at AJ who seemed to have been entranced by the hawk as well, "AJ, I want you to..."

But before she could finish her sentence the plan was already ruined. Daisy had stopped her little act. With everything that was going on, everyone's attention was off of her. They did not see her pull her gun out from her skirt. They did not see her as she skulked behind them. They did not see her as she pulled the trigger releasing a bullet into their skull. Guss and Hammond fell to the floor as she kicked the shotgun away from Dinkle. It all happened in a fluid if not sinister motion, before anyone could react.

Daisy started to convulse, her entire body shaking. But it did not look painful to Clementine, no, it was painful the way laughing too long was painful. A smile spread across the face of Daisy, it went from ear to ear and looked like a jack-o-lantern hid only by the long thin stripes of her silken hair. It was like she was breaking out of a cocoon, finally able to show her true face.

"Deceptive Daisy. Deceptive Daisy. Deceptive Daisy!~" She said as she danced around in a euphoria induced jig. The gun in her hand waving around like a fan.  "Oh god, I've never done two groups at once before." she said as she grabbed her pelvis through her skirt "Ohhh, this is too much!" She walked up to Clementine who was still on her ass from when Dinkle put her there. Quietly Daisy whispered into her ear, "Now we're sisters"

Clementine looked up in disgust, thoughts of the happy life Kenny was living with Sarita flooded her. Thoughts of Carlos and Luke, the group they led. How both of her families crumbled around her. "We are nothing alike," Clementine said never blinking as she looked into Daisy's soul. 

AJ thrust his makeshift dagger into the side of Daisy's leg. He twisted and Daisy let out a scream. As Daisy lowered her gun to shoot AJ, Clementine took his cue. Blasting up with as much force as her one good leg would give, she latched on to Daisy's arm and bit down as hard as she could. Blood filled Clementine's mouth, the taste of iron. She dug her teeth deeper into Daisy's hand, hard bone against her teeth. Daisy fired a harmless shot to the side and dropped the gun, pain radiating up her arm. "You little bitch!" Daisy yelled as she buried her knee into Clementine's gut. The sudden strike caught Clementine by surprise, this was not a wimpy little strike, this was a full-powered knee. Clementine fell to the floor clutching her stomach. It was too much, a bunch of venom spewed from her mouth. Hot pain flooded her midsection as she fell to her side. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see AJ fighting with all his might, and the sight made her body start to stand involuntarily. _Where was the help?_ Clementine thought as she struggled to stand. Ruby, Louis, and Willy: they had to be doing something. Clementine turned in the group's direction, they were on the floor being zip-tied! A large thin man with leather shoulder pads secured their restraints. Shock rushed over Clementine and fear of the situation started to take hold. Never had she been so utterly bested. She knew it was dangerous coming into this camp but she never expected it to end up like this. Clementine was still clutching her stomach when another man came into view: Mick. "You let your guard down Daisy, Boss Bill is going to be mad," Mick said with little pleasure in what he was doing, almost like he had a headache. 

"Nuh-uh," Daisy said in a rejecting tone. "You don't know him as I do.~" She said waving him off as an annoyance. Daisy bent down and picked up the gun with her one good hand. She pushed her bitten hand into her skirt, using it as a makeshift bandage. "Gimme your flask Mick" Daisy shouted, almost like an order. Mick easily obliged and tossed his flask over Clementine in a monkey-in-the-middle sort of way. Daisy caught it and quickly poured its contents over her new bite. Her face winced in pain.

Clementine smiled.

Mick continued walking over to Clementine and bent down to zip tie her. She jetted up trying to mimic her earlier gambit but Mick was ready for it, he kicked out her one good leg easily.   
Clementine hit the ground with enough force to leave a bruise, dirt smeared onto her face. Her vision was blurry but she could see walkers breaking through the breach made by the gas explosion, the gap in the wall engulfed by flame. Walkers elucidated by living fire sauntered toward her with an insatiable hunger. Her mind drifted to dark thoughts as Mick knocked her unconscious. 

 

**Present Time**

 

The dream of Lee and Kenny was still vivid in Clementine's mind but her head would not stop aching. She tried to focus her vision but it was hard in the darkness of wherever she was. Rotting flesh permeated the area all around her, and the strength of the smell was almost overwhelming. Covering her mouth with her hand Clementine struggled in the dark, feeling for the edges of her cage. A newborn kitten fumbling in the dark. She winced as her stump rubbed against the cold steel of the floor. They had removed her artificial leg. Using the side of her arm she felt her stump, it was ripped to pieces from using her artificial limb. Even though it was a marvel of engineering for her small group it was nowhere near the medical accuracy of the old world, her body would eventually adapt, but she only just started using it.

Feeling around the small vicinity she could make out that the area was about two feet wider than she was tall, but much longer. Beams of crimson light flooded in through rusted gaps and cracks of the enclosure.

Panic and claustrophobia started to weasel their way into her. Rapid breaths pierced the cool air around her. "Never allow yourself to be trapped" Lee's voice echoed in her head as she started to hyperventilate. Tremors started to overtake her as memories of that horrible night blanketed her vision. 

  
Clementine crawled to the nearest crack of light she could find and started using her elbow fruitlessly to try and make a way to escape. Her elbows were bloody and aching before the smallest bit of steel broke away. Clementine collapsed to the ground. Dirt filled her nose and mouth but she didn't care, she was at the end of the road. _Done_. 

"I-Is that you Clementine?" a small voice said in a cracking whisper, almost nonexistent. Clementine did not move, it felt like she did not even breathe. The hopelessness of the situation had consumed her, the thought of someone else being here was in the realm of fantasy.

  
"Clementine?" Said the voice almost crying. Sadness in the word woke her from her daze.

Light from the rusty hole that had been widened earlier flooded into the small container. Now that her eyes were adjusted to the dim light the scene struck her like a knife to the throat. Sitting in the far corner of the container they were in was Aasim.

Clementine and the others had been searching for weeks, yet they had found nothing. They thought he was dead.

This was not a happy reunion though. Clementine started crying as she looked over his body, she covered her mouth in horror and pity at the sight of Aasim.  
His shirt had been removed and there was little left of his pants as they had been torn to shreds.  
The scene was horrifying, blood and cuts lined his body, mangled flesh. His fingernails were missing, all that remained was crusted black blood. They were removed long ago. Red liquid dribbled from his mouth as he winced. But the most horrific part of the display was lined out in front of him: a pile of his own intestines. He had been disemboweled. Pools of blood had formed around him as he slowly bled out.   
"A-Aasim, is that y-you?" Clementine said in a quiet whimper.

Suddenly Aasim started crying as if realizing she was not a hallucination. How Aasim was still alive Clementine did not know, but he had to be close to death. This was torture on a level Clementine had never seen. Horrific and brutal efficiency. 

  
"I'm sorry Clem. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean too. I tried. I really tried." Aasim mumbled. Shame and guilt had filled him even in this situation. 

  
"What are you talking about Aasim?" Clementine said as she crawled over to Aasim to try and help. "You need to just relax and try to hang on". Aasim coughed up a bunch of blood and a huge chunk of something else in response. 

  
"I told them everything Clem," Aasim said through tears and blood. 

  
"What do you mean everything?" Clem replied just trying to keep him talking.

  
"Our home, our plans," Aasim said, then looking deep into her eyes "You. They wanted to know about you, Clem."

  
"Me? Like my abilities?" She said confused. 

  
"Your past" he replied "he was so infatuated with your history, it was the only time they would...they would stop." He said as he looked down in disgust of himself, "He said something about an Origin Point".

  
 _This is how Daisy knew so much about me._ Clementine thought, it sounded like they had all taken turns torturing him. Panic had left Clementine, along with doubt or self-pity. Every moment that passed gave her more reason to hate them all. 

  
"I'll kill them all Aasim. I promise you." Clementine said but Aasim didn't smile his frown just grew bigger. "You can be better than them Clementine. I know you, you act all tough and you are the strongest person I know, but deep down, I can still see you. The child that was born into this horrible world."

  
Clementine felt like she was back in that room with Lee. Chills ran down her back as kneeled over Aasim's body. 

  
"You did fine Aasim. Don't worry about anything, ok? Just stay with me." Clementine said through her tears. 

  
Using the last of his strength Aasim did his best to shift to the side, a large portion of his intestine slithered out of his stomach onto the grotesque pile in front of him, a disturbing picture of his fading life. 

  
"I know I'm dead Clementine, so do you. I don't have a lot of time so I need you to listen close," he said as he coughed up blood. The next words were a struggle for him to get out but he tried his best, "From what I can tell there are four of them total. They all report to some guy named Bill"

  
"Bill?" Clementine said as her mind raced to Carver.

  
"You need to be careful Clem, he is incredibly eccentric. So are the rest of them, I have never seen anyone like them...except maybe" he got quiet as he looked up at her, Clementine did the slightest of nods and it was left there.

  
Clementine was quiet as Aasim told her everything he knew, as fast as he could. They both knew what was coming and Clementine just wanted to respect him and memorize as much as she possibly could before it was too late. This was the unspoken wish, and she complied. 

Tanks and looted planes lined the abandoned airfield of the military base. The sun had just started to set sending red light in strips through the sky. Orange and magenta hues faded to bright yellow heat as the sun turned it's back to them.

Fences, though broken in many places, lined the fort. Bodies of walkers filled the gaps in the barrier. Grim and plague-like, the corpses stood taller than two men. Wakes of bereavement and destruction lined this place. Death and disorder at its source.

Mick walked with Daisy down the blood-stained pavement to the stack of shipping containers on the far side of the base. The bite on Daisy's hand had been bandaged but bruises were clearly visible on her neck from where Clementine had tried to choke her. Mick played with his golden revolver as they walked. 

  
"I told you it would be simple if we divided their attention. This was almost easier than Mccarroll Ranch." Mick said in a gruff tone belying his skinny frame, his colorful makeshift suit changing to bizarre hues in the fading red light of the sun. 

  
"That was so fun!" Daisy said, her face lighting up in joy. "They really thought I was a mother, ME! A MOTHER!?" Daisy said pointing at herself mockingly as she laughed. "They were all so weak though. None of them could even pass the first test" she said in a long drawn out sigh. As they walked Daisy started to skip, almost childlike joy as she got closer and closer to their prisoners. 

  
"Can I? Can I? Can I?" Daisy gleamed with joy. Mick spun his revolver one last time as they reached the door, "Go for it" he replied as he kicked the bottom of the metal container. Daisy unlocked the container like a child opening a present for Christmas.

 _Creaking_ loudly the door slowly swung outward. As light flooded into the container the scene became more and more clear to the pair. On the far side of the dark container, Clementine was on top of something slamming her elbow into it over and over again. Blood flew all the way to the feet of Daisy and Mick as Clementine continued to slam her elbow into the mass of flesh in front of her. Even with the new flood of light and the obvious amount of sound they were making Clementine seemed to be ignoring them.

Standing right behind her Mick bent down and grabbed her arm stopping her. Slowly he pulled her around so he could see her face. Clementine had no tears in her eyes. Just a hollow look of acceptance and the slightest grin lined her blood-stained face. She started to laugh as Mick dragged her away from the corpse of the walker. "We got a little monster here, don't we?" Mick said with a smile as he looked at Daisy. "Bill is really going to like her."

Daisy nodded but her mind was elsewhere. She sat infatuated by the scene in front of her. Slowly she walked into the container. Every step into the container made her knees weaker and weaker. The further she descended into the container, the more brutal and bloody the scene became.

Aasim's corpse lay in front of her.

Chunks of flesh and bone were all that was left of him. His face was so mangled she could no longer even tell who it was anymore.

Slowly Daisy bent down and caressed what was left of his face.

Mick shook his head and rolled his eyes and he started to drag Clementine to the center of the camp leaving Daisy to her incontinence.

"You were a close friend of hers," Daisy said still caressing the bloody mess. "You told me everything about her. You enlightened me, thank you."

   
Her smile grew as she slammed her free fist into the solid mass of flesh. Cracks of bone under her fist were ecstasy and every time her fist slammed into what was left of the corpse euphoria filled her body. Gooseflesh lined her entire back. "Were the same!" her fist slammed into the mound again "Were the same!", over and over she slammed her fist into Aasim repeating those words. 

Mick dragged Clementine to the middle of the camp. Concrete and broken asphalt lined the area. Streetlamps that had not been used in years, broken and rusted, formed ordered lines around the camp. Industrial and militaristic, it was mostly unremarkable.

Walkers lined the fences around the base, there were so many concentrated in this area. They were spread out but their moans and hunger infiltrated the very air around them.

Mick dragged Clementine and tossed her down next to Violet and AJ. Shocked and relieved they hugged and embraced Clementine but she could not even respond with physical contact, she was motionless as they tried to get information from her. Her attention was elsewhere.

Clementine couldn't take her eyes off it. Guns. Thousands and thousands of guns, as many guns as there were walkers around them. Rifles, handguns, shotguns, a tangled web of death.

They had been piled up into a mound that was three times taller than she was, it looked like they had been semi-welded together into some sort of obnoxious throne. Sitting at the top was the most massive man Clementine had ever seen. He sat above them looking down like an omnipotent god. His head was bald, and his arms were the size of watermelons. Veins popped out all over his body highlighting his giant muscles. Dinkle was big, but this man seemed twice the size. They had been dragged to the makeshift throne in a semi-circle. Violet, AJ, Ruby, Dinkle, Willy, and Louis were all positioned around the front of the throne looking up at Bill. 

Mick made a clicking noise with his tongue in the direction of the far side of camp where the man with the Hawk stood lugging a giant chest. 

"Dump um Austringer Dellinger," Mick said plainly. Quickly and without words, the man lugged the giant chest over to the throne of guns.

Almost as big as a man, the chest was strangely ominous, almost coffin-like. It had to be dragged on a dolly and even then it seemed difficult to move.

As Dellinger arrived Mick gave a wave of his hand.

Promptly the crate was set-down and opened. Inside were more guns, hundreds of them. 

  
Dellinger pushed the crate over with his foot and they all started flooding out onto the pile. "These are the guns from the School and the Caravan. It's everything we could find Boss Bill." Bill nodded a silent acknowledgment as the guns flooded out of the crate. Everyone's eyes widened as the pile grew even bigger. "We will be disassembling the ammo as well Boss Bill, it has been stored" 

Bill sat with one massive arm supporting his weight, the other positioned in almost a thinker-like pose. Mick stood behind the row of captured meat, hand on his revolver wishing someone would try and run. His finger twitched at the thought.

Beside him stood a tall man Clementine had only briefly seen. He was thin and wore a leather trench coat with a makeshift leather glove that went halfway up his left arm. Thick and rugged, the glove looked too big for his hand but the tips of the fingers had been cut out to give him greater dexterity at the cost of safety. Perched on a modified shoulder pad sat the hawk that had ripped apart Zran. The coloring on the hawks head gave it the likeness of a skull. Quietly it nibbled one of its talons as it waited for a command from its master.

Struggling to stay still Willy tried to lean closer to Clementine to ask her a question but the hawk man Dellinger standing behind him kicked the thought out of him. Cooly he shot the child a stern look without uttering a word. Willy stuck out his tongue and flipped him off. He received a bloody eye for his effort as the Austringer beat him repeatedly. Almost to excess.  

With a flick of his wrist, Bill commanded him to stop. Without delay, the kicking stopped and the Austringer stood at attention. Bill nodded.

Without words, Bill did a beckoning motion in Clementine's direction. Clementine did not move. Again he motioned for her to approach him. Again nothing happened. With the slightest look of annoyance, he looked up and then did the motion again. Clementine still did not move forward, she just crossed her hands and stood her ground. 

Bill snapped his fingers and pointed at Willy, "Teach her, Austringer Dellinger," With a swiftness, Dellinger grabbed the child by the collar and tossed him to the side. With a sharp whistle the hawk dove over and over ripping chunks of Willy out as it attacked him. Clementine couldn't hear Willy's screams over her own as the situation unfolded. She looked on in horror as he was ripped apart, his small body no match for the enormous hawk. Eventually, nothing but a red pile was left, the hawk sat over it eating its dinner.

Clementine collapsed in front of the throne. 

  
"I've been waiting" the words came out slow and methodical, a low monotone that vibrated to her core. Bill's voice boomed, "Welcome to the Crucible, are you the leader?"

Clementine looked up, dirt and blood covering her face. Everything in her body said do not respond. 

  
"Do not make me repeat myself Clementine," Bill said as he looked down at the frail woman in front of him.

 _He already knows I'm the leader,_ she thought, _he is playing games_

"How do you know my name?" She said.

  
With an almost sigh of annoyance Bill snapped his fingers in the direction of Ruby. As quickly as the action had been done Mick had already grabbed her and started dragging her off to the side. Her screams pierced Clementine like arrows. 

  
"Let's try this again," Bill said now noticeably more annoyed, "Do you know what _keelhauling_ is?"

  
The sudden change of the question and abduction of Ruby threw Clementine for a loop, Mick dragged Ruby away as Clementine contemplated if she should answer or not but she was backed into a corner. She bit down on the side of her tongue, the pain somehow giving her relief. "I've heard of it, but I'm not completely sure," Clementine said being far more honest than she would have liked to be. 

  
"Good, continue to be honest with me and there will be no more punishments," Bill said matter-of-factly.

  
"Punishments?" Clementine said confused. 

  
"Before this hell. Long ago, there were ships that sailed the sea. The world is a strange place, creatures of all sizes and types grace it" Bill said motioning around as if he was talking about the walkers around them "There is a creature called a barnacle that lives in the sea, almost parasitic in its function. They start to produce a hard shell directly connected to whatever they are attached to. These shells can be as sharp as knives."

  
Quickly Clementine became annoyed at every word coming out of this man's mouth. His holier than thou attitude coupled with his arrogance made her want to punch him in the face. 

  
"Who the fuck cares about some stupid sea creature?" Clementine spat out. 

  
"You will shortly," Bill said as he smiled. Like he was finally starting to get what he wanted. "As a form of punishment, the captain would have his crew tie a rope to the individual and then loop it under the ship. With the captain's command, the crew would pull on the other side of the rope dragging the victim under the ship." Every word of the story Bill said, his grin grew. 

  
"So someone gets dragged under the ship, and this is supposed to be the punishment? A swim? Who cares?". Clementine said more out of annoyance of Bill than lack of understanding about the subject.

Bill looked to the side, almost in disappointment. "A bit simplistic, but yes. It may be far more damaging than you imagine though. If the victim is dragged slowly, sure they might go for a swim as you say, but the crew is forced to drag the victim quickly, this ensures they are forced against the bottom of the ship. Extreme torture. Barnacles by the thousands can completely line the bottom of a ship, these foul creatures with their sharp shells will amputate and cut the victim. Over and over they would be dragged under the ship until they were freezing blue, or too dazed from repeated blows to the head. This method was used to  permanently _maim_." Bill said the last word with emphasis as he looked over her body. 

  
Clementine winced in repulsion.

  
"So what?" She said "Who cares about ships and barnacles? Why is it every William I meet so obviously a Richard?". Annoyance took over Bill once again and he seemed to flinch at the mention of William "I am asking the questions, not you" he said. 

Mick handcuffed Ruby and attached a giant metal chain to the middle of the cuffs using a padlock. Bill sat up in his chair making him look even bigger than he already was. Mick had dragged Ruby over to the front of an old run-down tennis court. Surrounding the court was a fence about ten feet tall. One door was on each side of the court to allow access to it. Within the court, hundreds of walkers had been collected into a small area. Mick easily tossed the chain he had attached to ruby over the length of the tennis court coming out the door on the opposite side. Time passed slowly as Mick performed his duty, Ruby wailing as everyone watched on. With purpose, Mick attached the other end of the chain to the back of a jeep that had been parked near the court.

Daisy walked to the side of the gun-throne finally rejoining them. Her dress was soaked in blood but it was only really noticeable on the white frills that adorned it and the bandage on her hand. Entering the circle she winked at Clementine as she approached her master. "You are late Deceptive Daisy," Bill said sternly as Daisy joined him at his side.

"Sorry Boss Bill, I was cleaning up the prospects mess," Daisy said looking up with the biggest puppy dog eyes Clementine had ever seen. Bill nodded and pet her head like some sort of sick pet. Daisy closed her eyes and accepted it lovingly. Reality started to make Clementine sick. Not just Daisy and Bill, but the horror on her friend's faces, the looks they would shoot her as they sat there, the look of desperation, of fear. The same look Sarah gave her so long ago.

  
Something started to build up inside Clementine, the darkness she always struggled with.   
Bill looked down in admiration and longing, he could see something inside of her, the more he learned about Clementine the more he was sure she had to be the one.

Bill snapped his fingers in the direction of Mick but his gaze never left Clementine. She was the one, he was sure of it, he would draw it out one way or the other. Mick entered the jeep without delay, the horror on Ruby's face was noticeable from the throne, and as the jeep roared to life the gravity of the situation started to overtake them all. Louis tried to make a mad dash to Ruby out of desperation but was quickly shut down by The Austringer. 

"You will answer my next question truthfully, do you understand?" Bill said looking into Clementine's hazel eyes. Before she could answer he posed his next question, "Have you ever seen an alpha?" he said leaning forward. 

  
"A what?" Clementine replied. A frown started to form over Bill's face. 

  
"You see all the wimps around us, have you ever seen one with red eyes? One that could move fast?" Bill said with utter seriousness.

  
"Move fast? Red eyes? On a walker? Never." Clementine said.

The frown on Bill's face became even more despondent as each word came out of her mouth. Disappointment filled his face like she had ripped an ice cream cone away from a baby.   
Slowly Bill let out a long-winded sigh and then made a slicing motion with his hand in the direction of Mick. 

  
"Wa-wait!" Clementine yelled out as she stumbled toward the throne on her one leg. "I answered truthfully I sware! I've never seen one before!" Bill just looked down at her in annoyance.

Mick pressed lightly on the gas pedal of the jeep, the chain jerked taut jerking Ruby forward onto her face, arms stretched out in front of her. "NOOOO, PLEASE NOOOOO!" Ruby yelled as the speed started to increase. Slowly at first but faster and faster as Mick gave the jeep gas, not too fast not too slow. Ruby screamed as she was pulled across the uneven pavement through the walker filled court. It was horrific for Clementine to watch but she did not turn away, every second that passed made her world fade to white.

Being drug across the concrete was worse than sandpaper, each foot she was dragged was another chunk of pavement into her arm or leg. Friction from being dragged burned sections of her clothes away as it started to dig into her flesh, and that was without the walkers diving down on her as she was dragged through them. Chunks of flesh were ripped out as the walkers coagulated together on top of her to try and grab a piece before she was ripped out of their reach. By the time the handcuffs reached the other side of the court, they were no longer attached to her body. Nothing was left of Ruby as the walkers swarmed over their new meal, ripping it apart. 

Clementine was biting down on her jaw as hard as she could, her hands forming fists through the lose mangled bandages that remained on her hands. Daisy gave a bunch of exaggerated expressions and movements as Ruby was dragged through the herd. It annoyed Clementine more than anything she had experienced so far. Daisy turned to her with a gasping look of bewilderment when Ruby did not come out the other side and Clementine _lost it_. She used every ounce of strength to jump to her one good leg. She could only hop, but Daisy way right in front of her. With a quick snap, she had already pounced on top of Daisy taking both of them to the ground.

Clementine's hands were mangled, she had already used them too much, and now her elbows were mangled too. Clementine only had her arms so that's what she used to try and choke her to death, but before she could even get started Bill had reached down and plucked her up like a ragdoll. He tossed her toward the court like a sack of potatoes. To Clementine, it felt like she flew twenty feet. She rolled as she hit the concrete but the impact knocked the wind out of her, she gasped for air as she tried to inhale with little success. Clementine choked for air as she fought to regain her breath. 

 

Mick had already exited the jeep and required the chain and handcuffs, now red and wet with Ruby's blood.

  
It was simple for Mick to attach the handcuffs to Clementine in her current state. Gasping for air. He popped a pill into his mouth as he dragged Clementine to the entrance of the court. Bill slowly got up from his makeshift throne grabbing a small soggy sack from his side before slowly walking over to Clementine.  He snapped his fingers in Daisy's direction without turning around "bring her leg to me" he said simply. Daisy turned around and immediately ran toward a building off to the side. She quickly returned with the leg and handed it to Bill, bowing slightly as she backed away from him. Without acknowledgment, Bill took the leg. He tossed it down to Clementine appalled by it.

Regaining some composure, Clementine quickly attached it as best she could.  
Slowly Bill crouched down, but even on his knees, he towered over her. "I know about Lee. I know about your Origin Point. Your friend Aasim told us everything." Bill said as tears started to fill Clementine's eyes, but she wouldn't let them out, not for this asshole.

"I can't believe you were so open with them." Bill grinned.

Yes, she told them everything. They were her family. The longer she stayed with them, the more she opened up.

Using that against her, it was disgusting. 

  
"Origin point?" Clementine said as she looked up at Bill. 

  
"Yes" replied Bill, "The point you became more than human." Clementine shot him a bewildered look before she half rolled her eyes. "More than human?" she replied as she struggled with her cuffs a bit testing the looseness, "You are crazier than I am".

Bill smiled a cool smile as he looked down at Clementine. A tiger looking down at its cub. "Do you want to know my Origin Point Clementine?"

  
Clementine made a quick snicker before spiting her reply, "I really don't give a shit about you". 

  
Continuing to smile his cool smile, Bill started his story anyway, "When this all started you were weak, worthless, pathetic. I know because I was too..."

"When the outbreak started I was a hard worker, obedient to the establishment. I came from a poor family and thought if I just kept my nose to the grindstone I would make something of myself one day. I worked as a coal miner. We would work, sometimes for weeks underground. There were rooms set up down in the tunnels for our particular setup, even areas with small motorized vehicles they could use to transport minerals and cargo."

Clementine gritted her teeth and slammed her now attached prosthetic into the man's groin as hard as she could.

She waited a moment for his reaction but it seemed more delayed annoyance than true pain or agony. Clementine gritted her teeth again and swung her leg up with all the force she could muster. Bill stopped it quickly with his giant boot and slammed it back to the ground from where it came from, the sheer force from the stomp created audible cracks from her prosthetic as pieces of its makeshift design flew in every direction. 

Bill grabbed clementine by the throat and pushed her against the cool hard concrete floor of the military base.

"You need to understand why, so that you can evolve as well little one"  Bill whispered against Clementine's horrified face. 

  
"I was a miner, a weak miner. Every day was darkness, weakness in the guise of strength and order." Clementine tried to say something but Bill's grip around her throat tightened to the point Clementine thought she would lose oxygen. Her face started to turn red before he loosened his grip. Out of the side of her eye, Clementine could faintly make out AJ struggling to save her as Daisy restrained him. Barely, just barely, Clementine could see her caressing his face as she straddled him down. Clementine hated these people so much.

Bill returned to his story, though Clementine wondered why he would even bother if he was about to kill her. The cuffs on her hands seemed to get heavier as the thought of ruby filled her mind. 

"There were many of us in that cave the night it all started. Over twenty for sure. Life is a strange thing, happenstance, chance. Destiny is a path the needs to be forged by both fate and willpower.

An earthquake random and mesmeric shook the mine, on the very night the dead started to walk the earth. What are the chances? Though at the time none of us had even realized what had started. We sat like good little children and waited for rescue.

But you know what happened next, don't you?"

 

Clementine hesitated for a moment but with his hand around her throat she just gargled her next words, "They never came" 

In an almost playful way, he looked deep into her eyes and eased his grip on her throat, "What did come?"

 

With a tinge of annoyance that she knew the answer she said it anyway, almost entranced by his way of talking. 

"The dead" 

 

Bill looked into her, "The dead."

 

"Looking back, everyone was running around with their heads chopped off. No leader, no direction, no order. Wild animals.

I finally saw under the veil, what was lying under the surface. Darkness and weakness.

One man. Jefferson. Stood out to me. He was three times my senior and by the way, he talked I know he had been through some type of conflict. He was a defined man, but he could see through the vail too. He had seen it for years. He came off as bitter and distant but behind these things was logic and fact. Jefferson was straightforward and direct, something people don't like. I attached to him in that time, he guided me as we tried day and night to survive.

After a month I would say only five of us were left, food had run out and water was hard to come by. Jefferson had tricks but could only get enough for himself and me which caused quite a bit of turmoil." Bill chuckled at the memory. His grip was all but relaxed now. 

"Jefferson was a genius, a survival expert, and had experience like no one I had ever seen. Every night he would go to the collapsed entrance and dig. Dig for hours and hours, it was all he would do most days. No one would help him. They would just say over and over it was useless, pointless, futile. They would say over and over they just needed to hold out for help. Jefferson knew help wasn't coming. Day and night, hour after hour he would dig. Even I..." Bill paused and looked at the ground. Clementine saw it at that moment, a sliver of weakness. "Even I doubted him. I would argue at times with him about digging our way out, so much stone was impossible to be moved. But every day he would dig.

In the end, it was just me and him. The food had run out. Everyone was dead. Only we remained. One night while exploring the deep maze-like caves for a possible back exit, I found _it_. But I did not find an exit, I found the mutilated corpses of our colleagues. I was naive. Jefferson would go into the deep caves for days at a time and sometimes return with fresh meat. People would go missing. It was dark in the tunnels, and even getting a fire going to cook was almost impossible. We made do with what little propane we had but eventually it too ran out. I questioned where the food was coming from but when you are dying starving, any food is good food. 

  
He was cooking our colleagues and feeding it to me. 

  
I confronted him about it as he was digging a way out of the entrance. He did not deny it. He did not lie. He was frank like he always was, 'it was for survival.'"

  
Clementine could sware she started to see the form of a tear in his eyes but if she did any hint of it was gone now.

  
"I went off on him like a fool, how long did I rant? I can't even remember anymore. It felt like hours. Whatever it was it was enough. Jefferson died that night digging. I woke up randomly and he was still digging like he had to make up for something. His hands were worse than yours are now. It was too much for his old body and he collapsed. 

  
He was dead.

  
Then he was alive.

  
He was more of a man then I will ever be. When he died it all finally made sense. It broke my barrier. I could finally see. And in his death something rose, an alpha. His eyes became a glowing red, and he was abnormally fast. I have never fought anything like it. And I have never seen it since."

  
Clementine looked into his eyes and with a stern face she simply said "What a joke"

Bill grabbed her by the throat and tossed her toward the entrance to the court violently. Slightly annoyed and done with his evil monologue. 

"You know what I did with Jefferson then don't you?" Bill said looking down at her demanding an answer with his glare.

"You killed him" Clementine gasped trying to regain her air clutching her throat.

"That's right, I killed him with my own two hands. And then I dug every day like he did until I got out." He said as looked down at his enormous muscles. 

 

"I'm tired of people like you, evil people that destroy what's left of this world. I was happy before this hell, I didn't know fear! I didn't know struggle!" Clementine yelled, talking more to the twisted world than to bill.

"And that's why you were weak, helpless. A lamb to be slaughtered. We will cleanse this world of that helplessness and make a new world, forged in fire and hardship." Bill said looking up like some sort of god figure.

"I won't let you take away my slice of the old world," Clementine replied.

  
"But I already have,"  he said as he slowly bent down and tossed the soggy red bag he had been holding in front of her. 

 

Clementine did not need to open it to know what it was, the shape and blood leaking from the bag made it clear, it was someone's head. The only person not with them was Omar, who was guarding the school. Her stomach dropped.

Bill spun his finger around in the air as he turned to return to his throne of guns, "Start it"

Mick was a step ahead of Bill and the cuffs around Clementine's wrists became taut as the jeep started to move forward. Clementine's heart started to race as panic flooded over her.

Daisy just watched with excitement like she knew something Clementine didn't. 

It started slow but the speed ramped up as Clementine was pulled through the entryway towards thousands of walkers. The concrete tore into the areas of flesh that were exposed and ripped her clothes that were not. As soon as she entered, walkers all around her started to dive. It was almost impossible to dodge as there was only one direction she could move: forward. Rolling left and right she was able to dodge a few hits but her body was getting ripped apart by the ground, her leather jacket was helping but just barely. Her arms were stretched out in front of her, dragging her forward. She needed to regain control of the situation. Without thinking her body moved on its own, she knew it would hurt but she didn't care. With all the strength she had she slammed her knees into the hard concrete to give her a little lift. Just barely she was able to push her feet out in front of her and use the forward momentum to do a sort of makeshift ski move.

Burnt rubber filled the air as the bottom of her one good shoe burnt away from the friction. Bits and pieces of her prosthetic flew in odd directions as it scratched along the concrete. Wrapping the chain around her wrists she was able to better hold it and direct her movement now that she was upright. All the while walkers bit and tore at her trying to get a piece for dinner.

An elbow into one, extending one of her legs to trip another as she blazed by. She was almost a moving weapon going at this speed. It seemed like it was over before it had even started. Seventy-Eight feet went by in a flash as she collapsed on the other side covered in blood and debris. Mick smiled as he got out of the Jeep and headed over to retrieve Clementine.

Clementine kicked and fought as walkers poured out of the exit doing everything they could to get to her.

  
 _Too many, there were too many!_ Without the jeep pulling her forward she had fallen onto the ground immobile, struggling to fight back with cuffs on. Inches from her face a walker opened its mouth, it wanted her nose.

 

*BANG*

  
Mick fired a bullet blowing half its face apart. Blood flew over Clementine's face as the walker was blasted away. More shots rang out as the walkers were culled back into the cage. Quickly Mick removed her cuffs and pointed her to the throne.

  
Suddenly Clem felt like she was being directed not forced. Like their attitudes had changed slightly.

  
"He was right! He was right!" Daisy chanted in the back hushed but loud with excitement.

Clementine followed their lead and walked to the throne of guns. Tower-like it hovered over her with Bill at its apex, blood dripped to the ground from her open wounds. 

Bill looked down at her,

  
"Listen to me, Clementine. This is the only chance I'm giving you to make the right choice. Join us and I will let what's left of your friends live. I know you know I'm not lying.

If you won't join us, I'm going to kill all of you and see if alphas really do exist."

  
Clementine was silent for a while, she wanted to turn to look at her friends but she knew what they would look like. 

  
"And what's to stop me from slitting your throat while you sleep?" Clementine replied.

  
Bill grinned, 

  
"You are welcome to try". 

  
Clementine sat and thought for a long time. If she looked at her friends she wouldn't be able to say yes. She needed to save them. Closing her eyes she took a deep breath.

  
"I'll join..." Before she could finish the sentence all hell broke loose. It happened so fast and she was still out of it from the keelhaul. She spun around to see what was happening.

AJ had overpowered Daisy somehow and had a hidden knife at her throat. Louis was trying to fight The Austringer with little effect, he was much stronger and more skilled than Louis and his hawk was circling around ripping chunks out of him with his talons.

Violet was attempting to help but the hawk was making things hard.

Bill just sat and watched as everyone fought.

Suddenly Dinkle had joined the fray, with his added muscle the three of them were able to overpower The Austringer.

Clementine could hear AJ yelling something into Dasiy's face as he swung the knife around in front of it. She couldn't understand it from where she was with all the commotion going on. It looked like AJ was going to kill her. 

Uncharacteristically Mick let out a giant sigh and without hesitation drew his golden gun and with a flourish shot AJ in the back. At least that's what he tried to do, Dinkle somehow noticed what he was doing and mid flourish he had jumped out in front of AJ.

*BANG*

Straight and true the bullet found a home in Dinkle's heart.

"Shoot ah kid wil yeh?" He grumbled before collapsing clutching his chest. 

In a flurry of anger, Bill flew down the throne with speed that seemed unnatural. Quickly and effortlessly Bill grabbed Mick's wrist, revolver and all, his massive hand enveloping all of it. With force, Bill bent it back. "Drop it or I'll break it even though I don't want to, it would be such a waste"  

  
"Yes Boss Bill" Mick said letting it go, Bill caught it with his other hand and tossed it onto the pile of guns. "Weakness and a crutch Mick, what did I tell you?" 

  
"You said to not kill any of them unless you gave the order," Mick said without delay.

  
"And look at him now!?" Bill said gesturing at Dinkle's convulsing body.

  
Bill, more of an act of annoyance than sympathy, bent over Dinkle's body and started smashing his head with the heel of his boot. Repeatedly he slammed his foot into the Dinkle's skull, the crunching stopped at a point but Bill's foot didn't. After there was nothing but a flat mound where Dinkle's head had been Bill turned to Mick.

Before Bill could talk Mick tried to formulate excuses, "I was trying to save Daisy, she is your favorite right?" 

  
Bill looked over Mick with annoyance, "Fickle Mick, are you implying your fellow generals can't defend themselves?"

  
Mick just looked around trying to find the right answer.

"You are lucky you are so skilled or I would have gotten rid of you by now Fickle Mick." Bill said as he looked him down, "So many vices. So many flaws. This is well past the third strike. Don't test me again." Bill released his grip on Mick and stood with his arms crossed. Slowly he turned to Clementine, "you were saying?" 

  
Clementine looked down at the blood oozing from Dinkle's neck where his head had been, she looked at her friends fighting, she looked into Violets eyes as she gave the slightest shake of her head. Clementine could hear her voice even without Violet talking,

"Don't do it, no matter what don't do it." 

  
She knew what would come next, the same thing that always came, _the monster_.

Clem nodded to the slightest nod to Violet as she reached down to the back of her prosthetic.

Bill looked behind himself to see what Clementine was nodding at.

Pushing a rod here, clicking a wood piece to the side there, a long thin blade found its way into Clementine's hand. Aasim, a gift from the grave. This was her chance, she shot forward, no hesitation. _She would feast on his heart._ The long makeshift blade was swift and keen but no vorpal blade. Somehow Bill had noticed what she was doing just by looking over his shoulder at Violet, before he had even turned back around he threw his massive arm up in front of his chest, the blade slid into it easily at first but as it hit muscle and bone the dull makeshift blade lost to the beast of an arm. Bill grabbed her arm and effortlessly threw her to the side. Clementine hit the ground with an enormous thud. She could hear her a few of her ribs crack as she hit the concrete. Every breath she took was pain on earth. 

"They have made their choice, stop toying with them and kill them if you have to," Bill said as he yanked the puny blade out of his arm. 

Daisy took this to heart and while AJ was distracted by Clementine getting tossed away she took Clementine's example. The small pen-size blade Daisy had retrieved from its hidden nest in her sleeve met AJ's eye socket as she dug it into his skull. AJ flailed as the sudden rush of pain overwhelmed him. He collapsed backward as blood poured out of his skull.

Two more hidden knives popped out of nowhere as Daisy twirled them in her hands skillfully before she slammed them into the motionless body of AJ. 

  
"Annoying kid _down_ ," Daisy said laughing.

   
Clementine could just make out what Daisy had said, she struggled to roll over and get a view of what was going on. The silhouette of AJ with three knives sticking out of him filled her view. Horror gripped her. She started to crawl, make her way to AJ no matter what. She gasped for air and clutched her chest as she crawled. Abandoning The Austringer Violet lunged at Daisy trying to do what Clem couldn't right now. 

  
Without the help of Violet, Louis was getting overwhelmed. Gashes of his flesh were missing from the hawk's talons and he was making little progress. Dellinger pulled two ornate daggers from his side, intricate and detailed these were far more elaborate than the small little knives Daisy was using. With quick stabbing motions and the help of his hawk, Louis was losing chunks of himself fast. Louis started to back away but the hawk just continued to follow him, circling around randomly. Trying to grab him.

Flying away the hawk was getting the room to swoop down on Louis to try one final attack to finish it. Diving with purpose and swiftness the hawk zoomed toward its prey to make the killing blow. Three yards, one yard, quickly it extended its razor-sharp talons to clutch the neck of its prey.  Louis closed his eyes and braced for impact.

Like a flying bus, Rosie shot out of the brush beside Louis up into the air and into the hawk. With animal precision, the dog majestically grabbed the bird out of the air like some sort of frisbee. The dog had the hawk by the neck and swung it back and forth like some sort of chew toy.

With clawing desperation, the hawk scratched at anything it could with its talons. One of them found a home and the hawk was free. It limped and struggled to fly as it hit the ground but eventually made it back to the air.

Louis looked up in surprise but so did The Austringer, in this moment of surprise Louis saw his chance. Rushing at him Louis aimed for his wrists and grabbed them as he tackled him to the ground. As they struggled it became clear Louis had made a mistake, he could feel the muscles in his wrists. Difference in strength is not always super apparent, but Louis was completely outmatched. Even giving everything he had it was impossible to stop him from exerting his will. Slowly the daggers found their way into his chest as the man turned him over now taking the dominant position. Screams from Louis pierced the air. 

  
Feathers and blood littered the area where the pet shop fight was taking place. Dellinger whistled to try and divert the hawk but it was so entrenched in the fight that it did not notice. Frustrated at his lack of obedience he whistled again. Louis just sat and chuckled as blood leaked from the blades in his chest. 

  
"What's so funny?" Dellinger asked in a heated tone. 

  
Louis just opened his mouth and stuck his mutilated tongue out. The suddenness of this shocked Dellinger and Louis took his chance, he swung the large stick, a makeshift club he had luckily found beside them, and slammed it into Dellinger's head. This instantly pushed Dellinger off of him and he was able to keep swinging. Keep swinging he did. Over and over again he slammed the club into the man's head. Over and over. To stop would be to die, this was his only chance and he would take it. Only after the makeshift stick broke did Louis stop swinging and collapse to the ground.

Bill looked at the corpse of Dellinger and visible anger washed over him. Like a towering entity of doom Bill towered over Louis. Finally, Louis looked up and the sight was too much, he knew he would die if he tried to fight him. Pain from the daggers in his chest was already too much, there was no way he was fighting the 'boss' and getting out alive. With all his effort Louis tried to crawl away, but this only made Bill angrier, 

  
"Running like a coward? Pitiful," He looked at Dellinger's corpse and spit. "He went out to such a _weakling_. Disappointing."

  
Louis tried to crawl but the knives in his chest made it hard, Bill easily walked along the trail of blood. Bending down he effortlessly flipped Louis over. There was nothing Louis could do, this man was even stronger than the other. Resisting was impossible. His body started shaking uncontrollably. Shakes from fear: violent, involuntary, overwhelming. His hair started to stand on end as Bill looked down on him.

Darkness had fully taken the camp as some form of emergency reserve power shot a few broken lights on to compensate. Orange light just further added to his terrifying figure.

Slowly and methodically Bill picked a stick up off the ground, did a few practice swings before tossing it away for a bigger one. More pleased with this 'club' Bill flipped it around in a flourish before he started slamming it into Louis's head. Bill looked like he was putting little to no effort into the swings but each hit did substantial damage. Unlike the small stick Louis had used, Bills 'club' did not break. After he was done bill tossed the stick to the side like a piece of garbage.

Daisy and Mick had started to close in on Violet, and Bill was rethinking his choice to stay out of the fight now that one of his generals had died. Mick shot him the closest thing to an 'I told you so' that he could muster without incurring his wrath.

Clementine had started crawling to the throne of guns, she had her eyes on the discarded golden revolver. With great effort she made it but it was impossible to hold the gun with her hands wrapped in these torn and tattered bandages. She ripped the bandages off along with bits of skin that had become agitatedly attached. Her hands looked even worse than she remembered. Bits of bone were visible in some places and the open-air was making it hurt even worse. Clenching her hand into a fist a few times to loosen it up she prepared for what she needed to do. 

Charging with reckless abandon Violet made her way to Daisy. She wanted her trusty cleaver as a weapon but she would have to make do without it. Maybe this would be better, she could _feel_ it this way. With a flourish daisy shot a dagger at Violet with a flick. It slammed into her shoulder but with the size of the blade and the strength of the throw it was not very deep and Violet yanked it out without trouble. _She had a weapon now_. She smiled. 

*BANG*

Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at Clementine, blood dripped off her knuckles staining the golden gun red. Smoke wafted up from the chamber. Clutching her chest and hunched over Clementine's gun hand did not shake one bit, she pointed the gun at Mick as she talked, "How is this suppose to get me to join you?" She said out of anger "Killing my friends! My family! We just wanted peace. A normal life."

  
Bill moved like he was going to talk but Mick beat him to the punch in a rare moment of seriousness, "You think you are the only one Clem? The only person to lose people? All of us are the same" Mick said as he popped a pill bottle out of his pocket and downed a few before chucking it off to the side, round tabs rolling everywhere,

"You think you are the only group destroyer? The only person that can't save the one they love?" Slowly Mick pulled a cigarette from his top pocket, it was old and dusty, moldy and crumpled. How it had even survived so long was perplexing. He put it in his mouth, lit it and took a deep drag. Despite the state of the cigarette, it looked far more enjoyable to him than the pills.

Bill frowned.

"Six years since I've smoked, Pepper hated it," Mick said.

  
Clementine gripped the revolver tighter, she could feel the trigger against her exposed bone, "What does this have to do with anything?"  
Mick just took another drag off his cigarette before replying, "Everything".

  
Flicking his arm to the side Mick flung the inner portion of his coat out revealing a second golden revolver. He hovered his hand over it ready to draw in some cowboy-like stance.

  
Confused, Clementine looked over him but he did not move. She could shoot him right now with no effort, there was no way he would beat her, but something about what he said, _the old cigarette_. It did not feel right.

She lowered her gun hand to her side. "I'm a bit of an expert with guns Mick," Clementine said as she assumed his position while holding her revolver at her side. Mick's cigarette glowed a hot red as he inhaled, smoke exited his nose like a dragon as he stood there only his fingers by his gun moving. His vision was completely on her gun hand, she did not have a holster so he would be at a disadvantage, but he was the best. His fingers became still as the moment drew closer.

*BANG*

Red velvet flew from Mick's head as it snapped back, a flashback to Marlon filled Clementine's head. Clementine's gun hand had not moved, it was still at her side. In her other hand, her old handgun. It was found by happenstance next to Mick's revolver, she took it as a sign. Clementine had managed to load a single .22 into the chamber from Mick's old revolver, it was her insurance. A shame she had to use it now. With his focus totally on the wrong hand, she had been able to draw it from her back and shoot him before he could even draw his gun. Violet had taken the shot as a signal to go and again lunged at Daisy with her own dagger. Daisy's finesse and skill with these small daggers was surprising and annoying. She easily deflected Violet's attack and returned with her own, stabbing Violet multiple times. Short quick jabs as she spun about in a flurry of attacks, some crazy Japanese shit Violet had never seen. There was no way Violet was beating her at her own game.

Swinging down with everything she had, Daisy went for the kill shot. Steep and fast it would be impossible to dodge at this distance, Violet had to go all in. She dodged to the side slightly at the last second causing the dagger to find a home in her shoulder where she had already been hit. Getting a second dose was worse than the first but it was just the first step. Violet grabbed the wrist controlling the other dagger Daisy was holding, Daisy was strong, stronger than Violet was but it did not matter.

Victory at any cost Violet thought as she slammed the small dagger through one of her fingers and into Daisy's wrist. Back and forth she pulled the dagger as deep and as far along her veins as she could. Blood started to spurt everywhere as her veins ripped open. Daisy fell backward and clenched her wrist trying desperately to stop the flow of blood. Violet licked the blood off her lips as she walked over to Daisy to finish the job. 

Before she could reach Daisy, Bill came up behind her and grabbed her by the hair. Shock snapped Violet out of her tunnel-vision. Clementine was trying to get a shot on Bill but with the way they were situated she did not want to miss and hit Violet.

Slowly Bill dragged Violet's unwilling body to a metal railing and started to slam her head into it. His brawn was just too much for a small girl like Violet to even compete against, she couldn't even struggle as he slammed her head repeatedly into the railing.

The ring echoed out every time her skull slammed into it. Fading into a haze of white, Violet's world floated away. Nothing even hurt anymore as she saw the face of her grandmother fade to red. 

  
*BANG*  
*BANG*   
*BANG*

  
It was too much to wait any longer, Clementine was too far away from him to get super accurate shots but she had to do something. Incredibly every shot hit him, but considering his massive size this was not really shocking. Flesh exploded off Bill's back as the bullets hit. Slamming Violet's head into the railing one last time Violet's lifeless body fell to the floor. 

  
Clementine looked on in shock as her corpse hit the concrete. Her gun hand started shaking as Bill started to walk toward her. 

  
Random shots rang out as Clementine tried to shoot him as he approached her. The few that missed were due to his abnormal dodging speed, like he could anticipate the shots. The closer Bill got - the more her hand started to shake, _she remembered this_ ,

she felt like a child again.

Bill grabbed her gunhand and wrangled the gun out of it, he carried her as she struggled to the center of the camp and tossed her lightly down. Casually he threw the gun to the side, unafraid of it. 

  
"Look around Clementine. Look around." Bill said simply as he spread his arms. 

  
Clementine did not want to obey him but her own curiosity got the better of her. It was a horror show. Blood had stained the cement of the area red like some sort of ritual. Feathers and chunks of flesh lined the circle. AJ was laying where she last saw him but being this close she could see it first hand, a dagger coming right out of his skull and two almost as big as him sticking out his sides. To the left of him was Violet, now a motionless corpse next to a bloodied railing. Behind her, the headless corpse of Louis and a bloody pile of pulp that was Willy. The right? Dinkle, who even in his last breath tried to save someone he didn't even know. She was surrounded by her dead family and friends. People that risked their lives for her.

Rosie was whimpering the last breath, too wounded by the talons to do much more than whimper, she would die soon. Next to her, a dead hawk. Clementine sat and took it all in. _It happened again_. Everyone was dead. Another group destroyed by her. She slammed what was left of her fists into the hard cold concrete, something she would have regretted if she cared about anything anymore. 

Daisy had done her best to wrap Mick's shirt around her wrist to try and stop the bleeding but it had just turned into a mass of soggy red shirt. Her annoying attitude had suddenly taken a break as she took in the scene and lamented in it. She wrapped her arms around herself in some sort of a self hug as she sat there somber. 

Bill started to talk as Clementine started to weep. "This is the world now Clementine. The weak die, the strong live. Do you think this is the first time this has happened? We systematically destroy communities. From Richmond to the coast we rape and pillage. We do as we please. From the ashes of these weaklings, we get strong warriors that know how the world works now. We have many others, just like you, it's a shame so many of my generals died. But that just shows how powerful you were. The strong will continue on, the human race will survive."

A reddish tinge filled the sky as the moon rose high above them. A blood-red moon. Its brightness was eerie and cast a red tinge over the horrific display in front of them. Clementine was half listening to Bill, and half running all the ways to kill him through her head. Clementine crawled over to AJ's body and started to break down. Memories of Kenny and Lee filled her head, the good times she would have with duck and Lilly before everything turned to shit. The longer her life went on the more fucked up it became.

Lilly filled her head, the moment she had held Clementine at gunpoint with her friends locked up as she tried to recruit her to fight these monsters. She was a monster, but maybe she was right? Maybe they should have gone with her. Tried to stop this massacre. Stop these monsters. 

  
 _Monsters_.

  
Clementine looked down at her torn up hands. At the red that coated her body. At all the blood around her. Her tears stopped as she reached into the pool of blood under AJ. There was so much she could easily cup it in her hands. Thick, it ran slowly off her fingers as she turned her hands over entranced by it. Suddenly she slammed her hands onto her face and dragged them down it, red streaks of AJs blood covering what was left of her. Clementine started to laugh. A maniacal laugh that felt good. It felt so right to just let it all go. AJ was still clutching his makeshift dagger in a death grip. Clementine slowly and carefully took it, respecting him as best she could. She ran the dagger across her nose and smelled it. Steel and blood. The smell of iron. Pain had left her body completely as everything started to go white. 

Bill was still going on his monolog, but her starting to stand up cut him off short, "See, we are your family now Clementine. A family where the stong will live on.-" Clementine was done, she started to sprint at him, her prosthetic dug into her stump as she ran but her pain was gone now. Bill knew what she was going to do, but clementine did not care. Everything was so clear now. Bill braced for the swing and Clementine obliged. At first, it looked like Clementine was going to go for his arm, but at the last second, she slipped under him, through his massive legs. Blood on the hard concrete lubricated her slide allowing her to go further. As she whizzed under him she slammed the small knife into his leg and left it there. She was not really a knife person. Clementine made a mad dash for the gun Bill had so carelessly tossed away. Her equalizer. Daisy had realized what she was doing and started to rush in to help. Bill spun around as fast as he could with his massive body and held his hand palm out to Daisy, "Stop! You will not interfere with this." 

The revolver was in her hands. Cold steel a masochistic pleasure as it pressed against her mangled skin. _This is when I'm at my best when I don't have to worry about weaklings dying_ , The cancerous thought made her a bit sick to her stomach as she looked at Bill.

"You want a warrior Bill? Come and get it." Bill rushed at her like a charging bull. Clementine looked down the cylinder, _four shots_. She waited. She could not afford to miss. Bill was almost to Clementine but she did not move.

Her hand was steady, more steady than it had ever been.

Gently she pulled the trigger, sure of her shot. Almost like instinct Bill reacted to her and weaved to the left. The shot went wide. _Three bullets_ left. Bill swung his fist around in a haymaker that would topple a horse but Clementine easily dodged under it. She shoved the revolver into his gut and pulled the trigger. Blood exploded outwards as the bullet flew out the back of his body. _Two bullets_ left.

Bill seemed to stagger slightly but he was unrelenting. With his other hand, Bill threw all of his strength into an uppercut from below. Clementine tried to dodge but his fist was too massive and connected with her stomach. Clementine toppled over as vomit and bile poured out of her mouth.

"One punch little duck? That's it?" Bill said in a mocking tone as he towered over her.

Coughing Clementine quickly pushed the barrel into the side of his leg and fired. She had hit his shin and fragments of it sputtered out the exit hole in an explosion of bone. _Last bullet_.

Bill had fallen to one knee. Whether he wanted to or not.

Losing such a massive bone in one of his legs had to be enough. Even on his knee like this, he was still perched high above her.

It would have to be enough. The shot was now. She would end it here.

Rushing up she pushed the gun up into his jaw as hard as she could and pulled the trigger,

but it would not move.

She pulled it to the point she thought her exposed fingerbone might break. It wouldn't fire.

Bill had grabbed the chamber of the gun and was preventing it from turning. She couldn't fire. With his free hand, he grabbed her wrist and bent it back causing her to let go of the gun. Bill took it and tossed it behind him,

"Guns are a crutch, weakness, and overconfidence. Mick liked guns too, and I only let him use them because of his skill. You could replace him, be better."

Clementine spit into his face, it being full of blood was a surprise benefit. Using the shock she headbutted him in the nose as hard as she could. More from the suddenness of it all, than from pain, Bills grip on her loosened just enough for her to yank AJ's knife out of his leg and into the side of his arm.

Involuntarily his grip loosened enough for her to squirm out. She rushed for the gun again but it was too obvious. Bill stuck his one good leg out and tripped her. He was still getting used to not having a shin bone.

Clementine hit the dirt face-first but quickly recovered and scrambled for the gun. Bill had returned to standing on both his legs. _How?_ Clementine did not know. It should not be possible. "Don't you feel pain?" Clementine said out of shock. This man had a missing shin bone, a point-blank gunshot to the abdomen, stab wounds, and multiple other bullets lodged into his body. Bill just grinned as he slowly walked towards her, "You can control pain, with a little practice" This man was a walking tank. Unrelenting, never stopping.

Clementine turned and started to run into the forest. The sudden cowardice was a surprise to Bill and he sat there mouth gaping for a moment before it registered. He turned to Daisy who had been quietly watching the fight with great interest, "Quickly, go to the med-bay and fix your wrist the best you can. Guard the camp while I retrieve her.

Do not follow us my Deceptive Daisy." Daisy nodded as Bill started to run into the forest after Clementine. 

The blood-red moon illuminated the forest nicely. She ran and ran. Pain started to seep into her body as the adrenalin from the fight started to fade. _Just a mile to go._

Bill chased her through the illuminated red forest. His leg was giving him problems but he felt like the shot to his gut was worse, it had to have hit his intestine, he could feel a growing ache from inside. He smiled, she was strong, determined, another Daisy. Maybe stronger. _Why was she running like a coward all of a sudden?_ _She had to be planning something_. Tracking her was hard in this darkness, but her prosthetic and limping made her easy to follow. 

After about an hour Clementine came out of a clearing, she was where everything started. The train station. Thoughts of AJ and Violet filled her head and she fought back tears as she ran behind the far train car and waited. She would kill him for what he did, her mind was made up. She would make sure it was _slow_. 

Bill entered the train station shortly after, huffing and puffing as he looked around, "Here huh? Why not your school? Afraid of what you'll see?" He said trying to bait her out. Clementine checked her pistol, still, one bullet left,

"Afraid? We just killed all your generals, they seemed pretty weak if you ask me."

Bill heard where she was and rushed behind the train but no one was there.

"I mean, how do a bunch of kids manage to kill your generals?" Clementine taunted from farther away. Bill rushed to the corner where the voice came from but Clementine was gone,

"You can't hide from me forever Clementine." 

"After I kill you, Bill, I'm going to go find Daisy and torture her. She will wish I had killed her after I'm done" Clementine said.

Something about this infuriated Bill and he rushed inside the train car where the voice was coming from but still nothing.

"You are a torturer too? So many skills I don't know about. You are quite the little monster" Bill spat in a verbal counterattack,

No sound. No response. Nothing. Silence as red light flooded the trainyard. "Your friends made you weak Clementine. They were a weight that held you down. Join us and be free, you can be your true self around us. You don't have to worry about anyone dying anymore, just embrace it."

Slowly Clementine stepped out from behind a tree, the golden revolver pointed at Bill's head. "Don't move Bill,"  Clementine said bluntly.

"Or what?" Bill replied, "You are going to shoot me? You are going to risk everything on that last bullet?"

Clementine gave away her hand slightly as she stumbled back briefly in shock, _He had had the clarity of mind to check the ammo in the revolver before he tossed it to the side?_ _He knew she was going to pick it up again?_

"Just leave, I'm not going with you, I won't ever join you. I'm not a monster." The edges of Clementine's lips curled up into a wicked smile as she said the last words.

Bill started to approach her, first slowly but faster and faster, just like he did at the military base. Clementine just stood her ground and waited. Ten yards, five yards, three yards. Bill reached out his hands to grab her by the neck but just as his fingers wrapped around it they were pulled away as he fell into the pitfall trap Clementine and all her friends had made so long ago. Falling with so much weight onto a broken leg finished the job and he could no longer stand.

Clementine started to laugh as she looked down on him for once,

"I lied Bill, sorry," Clementine said trying to hold back the wicked smile that was starting to fill her face.

From Bill's point of view, the blood-red moon and Clementine were the only things he could see, her silhouette illuminated in red. She was the one he had been looking for: A true survivor. Born and bred into this new world.

Bill accepted it all, he had lost. Fairly. This was no crutch, she baited him into this trap, and he fell for it. _Like a worthless animal,_  "Go ahead then and do it, kill me."

Clementine crouched down and cocked her head, the moon some kind of evil halo. She whispered into the hole

"I'm going to", before wandering off.

Bill couldn't move very far with his leg completely broken but he could hear Clementine moving back and forth gathering something. After a very long time, she poked her head over him in an almost childish way.

"When I was a kid, you know those true stories you would hear that would horrify you? Imagine in a time of peace, where everyone lived happily. Imagine if you lived that life and someone told you there were monsters on the other side of the world that would stone people? Kill them slowly by tossing heavy stones at their heads as a form of punishment?

Gosh, how _horrifying_." Clementine smiled,

"I guess they would just take a big rock like this," Clementine pointed at a fairly large rock that she could barely hold with one hand. "And just toss it at their head," She said as she looked at it with a puzzled face before throwing it into the hole at Bill. She was aiming for his head but it slammed into his arm instead. An audible crunch exited the hole as it impacted but he did not say a word or show any sign of pain.

Bill looked up at her, "You know why you can do this?" He said in a quiet voice, "Because you are strong". The words hit her to the core and she tossed another rock on top of him out of anger.

Every rock she threw, he would just compliment and encourage her to continue. Even when he was gargling blood he was still egging her on. "This is what we need to survive now." Another rock struck his leg. "You are the chosen one, the replacement we have been looking for" Another rock to the side of his head.

His mumbling became random and distant as she continued. Multiple times she had to collect more stones, it was taking much longer than she had thought but she had stopped aiming for his head as soon as he stopped making coherent sentences. 

  
Even after he stopped moving she kept throwing stones into the pit, over and over onto his lifeless corpse. After a minute she collapsed to the ground.

It was done. But she did not feel better, she felt worse.

Every word he said was burned into her mind, there was no way she could ever forget this moment. Slowly she walked to the center of the trainyard and got to her knees as she looked up to the moon. "I miss you Lee," she said as she pulled out the golden revolver and pushed the barrel against the side of her head. _One bullet left_. Always save it for yourself. Slowly she pulled the trigger.

*Click*

  
Nothing happened. 

  
She checked the cylinder. The bullet was there, she ordered it back to the front, put the barrel to her head, and pulled the trigger.

  
*Click*

  
"What the FUCK!?" Clementine yelled as she threw the gun to the ground out of anger.

  
*BANG*

The gun fired as it hit the ground and Clementine looked at it puzzled. 

 

All of a sudden Clementine could hear growling from behind her. Slowly she returned to the hole where Bill had been tortured, and she saw it. Red eyes. She shook her head and rubbed her eyes, it couldn't be real. Maybe just light from the moon reflecting off the walker's eyes? But she smashed its head multiple times? It did not make sense. Suddenly the walker jumped at her almost making it out of the hole, Clementine fell backward out of shock. _Did it just jump?_  No, it must have tried to crawl up the side.

She could hear it moving around in the hole, trying to get out. She leaned over the side and the sight of her face instantly drew its attention. It lurched and struggled to exit the hole. Clementine whipped the sweat from her forehead, _It was her imagination._

Like an answer to her thought the creature lept out of the hole on top of her. The suddenness of it threw her completely off guard, she had never seen anything like it. Now, even on top of her, it's red eyes burned. She struggled to get it off, but it was as strong and fast as Bill was.

And now it was dead and moving.

Its teeth chomped down trying to get a bit of her flesh. It took everything she had to just keep from getting eaten. No weapon, no knife, nothing. She wrapped her hands around its neck and held its face away from her as best as she could muster. She pushed her back against the ground and kicked the giant creature with both her legs backward, back into the hole it came from.

She turned and started to run to the old train building in the back. It was hard to run with the layout of the area. The ground was uneven and train tracks littered the area. She looked behind her, she had to have left it in the dust.

It was right behind her.

She stumbled in shock. Trees overhead turned the bright moonlight into rays of red. As the walker stumbled towards her it had an almost strobe-like effect, it was hard to judge how it was moving. _Was it running? Or was it his massive legs? But shouldn't one of them be broken?_ Clementine thought it best to stop thinking and start running faster.

As she made it inside the old train building it became clear, there was no exit from this point. If she crossed this line, it had to end in this room. No weapon, no gun. 

She darted for the far side of the room and waited for the walker. Bursting through the doorway with its massive body, the walker stood still for a moment. The way the moonlight poked through the broken roof made it look like the walker was smiling, but the next moment red moonlight revealed a normal gaping mouth. Menacingly it approached her. Clementine backed away, slowly. Closer and closer it got and suddenly it hunched back to lunge at her. Just as the walker jumped Clementine kicked a barrel to the side releasing a rope.

Aasim, Willy, AJ, Violet, everyone, this is thanks to you. A barrel full of rocks and concrete debris swung full force into right into the walkers head. It flung back with enormous force landing on its back. Clementine plopped down in relief. She bet it all on that one attack. Thank goodness it worked. 

As Clementine sat taking in a breath of air, she could start to hear grones coming from the walker's corpse.

"What?" Clementine said to herself as she started to get up. Suddenly its fingers started to twitch.

Clementine needed to cut this off now, before it started. She leaped forward before the walker could get to its feet. Quickly she straddled the enormous walker and forced it back to the ground. Over and over she slammed her fists into the walker's head.

Muscular and bony was the best way to describe it. Her hand started to shatter as she slammed them into its giant face.

Then she saw it.

A ray of moonlight illuminated a rusty old crowbar. Stuck to the wall with age and decay it had sat there untouched for years.

Until Clementine ripped it from its slumber. 

 

Daisy watched on as Clementine slammed the crowbar into Bill's face over and over. She had disobeyed his ordered and chased after him. She was feeling faint from blood loss and it was hard for her to keep up.  Her face was a sad display of horror. Her champion, her master, her protector, getting his face shredded apart by an old crowbar. 

Quickly Clementine started to slow down. After so much overexertion she was out of gas. Collapsing to the side of Bill she let the crowbar fall beside them.

Daisy pulled out a small dagger and crouched over her slowly. Tears fell down her face and her hands could barely hold the knife because they were shaking so bad.

When Clementine saw Daisy's face it was all despair. Not a thing you could fake. Blubbering and real. Clementine saw herself in her, in some twisted way.

Moving her arms was impossible, she tried but they felt like jelly.

Daisy raised the knife to kill Clementine but was met with a haymaker from Violet. Dried blood plastered her ears, and deep gouges lined her face. Daisy flung to the side like a ragdoll. Over and over Violet punched her face. She was going to kill her. End the threat.

"You, motherfucker, shitfuck, pissant, shitbird, fuckcunt, asshole, dick, weed, pice, of, shit." With each word, Violet punched her face.

Time seemed to slow down for Clementine as Violet suddenly emerged. Everything happened so fast and she was confused from exhaustion. Looking on, Clementine watched as Violet slammed her fists into Daisy.

_It was not right._

She saw herself in Daisy, the cycle that happens over and over again. Those taking the one you love. Pain, internal pain. It eats away at you. Makes you into a monster. Violet continued to punch Daisy. Clementine saw it in Violet now too, her eyes as she unloaded into Daisy. _The monster._

  
"Stop," Clementine said quietly.

  
Violet continued.

"STOP!" Clementine yelled at Violet with enough force to state her point. 

Violet stopped suddenly, blood flinging off her destroyed knuckles. 

  
"Clementine we can't let her live...not after everything she has done!" Violet pleaded. Clementine shook her head back and forth. "I'm done being a monster. Let's go home." Violet looked down at Daisy, broken and still crying, then looked back at Clementine.

They embraced as Clementine started to cry tears of joy. 

"I thought you were dead," Clementine said.

"It would take more than that to kill me, I'm one tough motherfucker," Violet said as she pointed at her chest,

"And look, Clem, AJ is still alive too. I checked on him after you guys ran off, he was still breathing, very very faintly but still breathing. I took him to the infirmary on the military base. It was stocked to the gills Clem. I patched him up as best I could and ran after you. He is hidden where the trapped food was at."

  
It was so much information so fast, Clementine followed Violet to the food floor door as she explained. AJ was lying there, patched up, unconscious, but breathing normally. "He is one tough motherfucker too," Violet said as she picked him up. 

 

"What about the others?" Clementine said as they tried to get away from this place as fast as they could. 

  
Violet just shook her head. 

 

They walked quietly to Ericson's under the blood-red moon.

 

**Epilogue**

 

6 Months Later

Clementine sat with AJ looking out the window as the rays of sun jetted into the room. It was warm on her face. Gently Clementine brushed AJ's hair and sat with him as they watched the sunrise paint the sky a bright orange hue. Red rivers of color lined the bottom.

Violet came into the room, black circles under her eyes. "Shifts over, your turn squirt," Violet said as she entered the room.

Frowning AJ huffed as he took the rifle and head out into the yard. His face was covered by an eyepatch, and he huffed with every other word, something to do with his lung we think, but none of us are doctors.

Violet crossed her arms, "You gonna take watch anytime soon Clem? I need a break." Clementine looked out the window as the sun pelted her face. "I've been thinking a lot about Tenn." Clementine said suddenly, "Well about everyone actually, but him a lot."

Sitting next to Clementine, violet wrapped her arm around her, she enjoyed her warmth.

Clementine enjoyed her touch but it did not help her melancholy mood,

"He thought that you went to a better place after you die. I hope he's there now. But. I think we are already dead. I think this is hell, and if you die, you are just gone. A monster to eat those you love, and then they eat others they love. Even the survivors, lose their humanity day by day as the world falls further and further into chaos." Clementine looked down, "I just...I just don't want to be a part of it anymore. Every day. I think about it. About everything. I'm cursed, everyone around me always dies. I just want it to be over Violet." 

  
Violet sat quietly for a long moment not really knowing how to respond, she was not really a wordsmith, "I love you, Clem, you know that." Violet took hold of Clementine's hand. She could feel the deep scars and jutting bones where her hands had healed as best they could.

"We are survivors, we will keep on keepin on you know?" Violet said trying to cheer Clem up. Clementine just continued to look down. Slowly Violet leaned close to Clem.

"We're bad motherfuckers," Violet whispered. With a wink and a grin, Violet somehow managed turned the grim environment into a slightly humorous situation. Clementine grinned a little. Violet gave her a quick kiss and lifted her up,

"let's go out today, just give it a try you know?" Clementine looked beside Violet to Lee, he nodded.

Clementine wiped her eyes and begrudgingly followed Violet, who despite being very tired was enthusiastic. 

The door closed behind them as they went out on watch. 


End file.
